Here is a series of images from La Fontaine’s fable The Cat Transformed into a Woman by different artists with the poem translated.
Marc Constantin’s song sheet – The Cat transformed into a woman from the La Fontaine’s fable, 1846.
A bachelor caressed his cat,
A darling, fair, and delicate;
So deep in love, he thought her mew
The sweetest voice he ever knew.
By prayers, and tears, and magic art,
The man got Fate to take his part;
And, lo! one morning at his side
His cat, transformed, became his bride.
Edward Bawden – My Cat Wife, 1986
In wedded state our man was seen
The fool in courtship he had been.
No lover ever was so bewitched
By any maiden’s charms
As was this husband, so enriched
By hers within his arms.
He praised her beauties, this and that,
And saw there nothing of the cat.
In short, by passion’s aid, he
Thought her a perfect lady.
It was night: some carpet gnawing mice
Disturbed the nuptial joys.
Excited by the noise,
The bride sprang at them in a trice;
Tirzah Garwood – The Cat Wife, 1928
The mice were scared and fled.
The bride, scarce in her bed,
The gnawing heard, and sprang again,
And this time not in vain,
For, in this novel form arrayed,
Of her the mice were less afraid.
Through life she loved this mousing course,
So great is stubborn nature’s force.
In mockery of change, the old
Will keep their youthful bent.
When once the cloth has got its fold,
The smelling-pot its scent,
In vain your efforts and your care
To make them other than they are.
To work reform, do what you will,
Old habit will be habit still.
Nor fork nor strap can mend its manners,
Nor cudgel-blows beat down its banners.
Secure the doors against the renter,
And through the windows it will enter.
Marc Chagall – The Cat Transformed into a Woman, 1926
In 1926 Ambroise Vollard commissioned Chagall to illustrate La Fontaine’s ‘Fables’. ‘The Cat Transformed into a Woman’ illustrates the story of a man who so adored his cat that he was able to turn her into a woman and marry her. He thought she would be the perfect wife. However, he soon realised he could not change her in every respect, as she still chased mice. †
After returning from Africa and Europe via Dunkirk, Edward Bawden continued his war work and went to paint army maneuvers at Dunwich on the Suffolk coast. Troop and tank testing with flame throwers on the heath and in the woodland. But this post really is about Bawden’s return there in 1948 in peacetime, but the war work makes a curious contrast.
Edward Bawden – Exercise Kruschen (Dunwich Common): Ronson Flame-throwers, 1943
Edward Bawden – Exercise Kruschen (Dunwich Common): Tank Fascines; the ‘Snake’ Ronson flame-thrower, 1943
1948
It is reported that John Nash and Edward Bawden went on a trip to Dunwich, staying at the Barne Arms (Now the Ship). It is probable to guess that John Aldridge joined them too. Below are various pictures from that trip.
Edward Bawden – Cliffs at Dunwich, 1948
Edward Bawden -The Church at Dunwich, 1948
Edward Bawden – Ilex & Fir, Greyfriars Wood, 1948
The most curious trick that Bawden uses are in some of the following paintings, the main features are just outline, the bridge in Lovers Lane, the Ash Bins and also the Coastguard station on the cliffs – just the most simple and abstracted forms. In Cliffs at Dunwich painting above the building again is abstract in the landscape.
Edward Bawden – Lover’s Lane, near Dunwich, Suffolk, 1948
Edward Bawden – Ash bins, this picture was exhibited at the Royal Academy.
Edward Bawden – An Old Coastguard Station, 1948
Edward Bawden – A Dry Moat, 1948
Richard Scott – Artists at Walberswick, 2002, p101
Great Bardfield being a small community of artists, it is only natural that they would borrow ideas, items and homes from each other to work in. Here are a few examples of connections in illustrated books by the people in the community that all were published within a few years of each other.
Edward Bawden – Sunday Evening, 1949 (Life in an English Village)
The picture above shows the sitting room at Ives Farm, Great Bardfield. Tom Ives is pictured in the corner with his pipe. It’s depicted in a lithograph by Edward Bawden from the King Penguin book ‘Life in an English Village’ (1949), around the same time Aldridge himself used this house in a book illustration for ‘Adam Was A Ploughman’ (1947) by Clarence Henry Warren.
John Aldridge – Living Room, 1947 (Adam Was A Ploughman)
On the fireplace you can see a Staffordshire figure of a lion by a tree, it was illustrated again on another page in ‘Adam Was A Ploughman’, pictured below.
John Aldridge – Lion, 1947 (Adam Was A Ploughman)
The photograph below is from Volume Five of The Saturday Book (1945), in a chapter by Edwin Smith on ‘Household Gods’ and is the same Staffordshire Lion.
Edwin Smith – Lion, 1945 (The Saturday Book)
Back to the drawing of Ives farm living room is a corn-dolly hanging up, below in the King Penguin book ‘Life in an English Village’ I have picked it out in yellow.
John Aldridge – Living Room, 1947 (Adam Was A Ploughman)
Edward Bawden – Corn-dollies, 1949 (Life in an English Village)
To the bottom right of the image above is also the bell used in the Pub lithograph below. Below the bell, the one-eyed man is Fred Mizen, a gardener and thatcher who also had a talent for making corn-dollie, it is likely all of them are by him.
Edward Bawden – The Bell (detail), 1949 (Life in an English Village)
Michael Rothenstein – Clock and Candlestick, 1942
The painting by Rothenstein above is a curious still life of a table and village scene. Curiously enough these items appear again in fifth Volume of The Saturday Book, along with the Aldridge Lion photograph. The article mentioned the clock ‘flanked by exotic shapes contrived from coloured balls on candlesticks’ it is wisely assumed that the picture is from Rothenstein’s house.
Edwin Smith – Clock and Candlestick, 1945 (The Saturday Book)
Clarence Henry Warren – Adam Was A Ploughman, 1947
Leonard Russell (Editor) – The Saturday Book, 1945
Noel Carrington – Life in an English Village, 1949
It is always interesting to look at how an artist illustrates a book, what scenes are chosen for the dust jacket. Normally when a book goes into paperback form the publisher either uses the same image from the hardback copy or gets another illustrator in, but with this Iris Murdoch book Edward Bawden would do two covers. Once for Faber & Faber in 1952 and again for Penguin Books in 1962.
Edward Bawden – The Flight From The Enchanter by Iris Murdoch, 1952
The design of the 1952 dust jacket is a mixture of collage of linocut and ink drawn design of cliffs and lettering. The colour was added by the printer under Bawden’s instruction
‘You get real fish here,’ said Annette. ‘Let’s see the real fish.’ She turned and suddenly made for the fish-bowl. Mischa followed her. Annette looked at him from the other side of the bowl. †
Edward Bawden – The Flight From The Enchanter linocut design,
printed for Edward Bawden’s Book of Cuts 1978.
Edward Bawden – The Flight From The Enchanter by Iris Murdoch, 1962
Then with a quick movement she kicked the chair away and hung stiffly in mid-air. The chandelier felt firm, her grip was strong, there was no terrible rending sound as the chain parted company with the ceiling. After all, thought Annette, I don’t weigh much. †
Iris Murdoch – The Flight From The Enchanter, 1952
1956 was a busy year for Edward Bawden. In the medium of linocut he completed two prints of Brighton and three large prints based in Great Bardfield. He illustrated the book The Sixpence that Rolled Away and designed the dust jacket for The Flight from the Enchanter by Iris Murdoch in linocut as well.
Further illustration work came with a lino cut of An Old Crab and a Young Crab and an etching of Watermellons for A Handbook of type and Illustration by John Lewis. Fortnum and Mason would commission him to illustrate their Christmas catalogue, something he used to do in the 1930s. In magazines and newspapers he designed a series of adverts for Chubb Locks.
Other than making prints close to home in Great Bardfield, Bawden travelled to Ironbridge. In the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition he displayed his watercolours of Canada painted in 1951 and Enna in Sicily, painted in 1953.
Edward Bawden – Enna, Sicily, 1953. From the RA Summer Exhibition 1956.
We start at home in Great Bardfield where Bawden was printing the linocuts of Ives Farmhouse and the farmyard behind the cottage.
Edward Bawden – Ives Farmhouse, Great Bardfield, 1956
Ives Farmhouse is listed as the name of the print in the editioned version but there are a handful of ‘artist proof’ copies of this print titled The Road to Thaxted, like the copy the Fry Gallery own.
Edward Bawden – Ives Farm, Great Bardfield, 1956
One of the Ives Farmyard proofs has ‘poor print done by EB because no printing press.’ I would assume they mean the patchy printing of the colours.
Edward Bawden – Study for: Town Hall Yard, Great Bardfield, 1956
Edward Bawden – Town Hall Yard, Great Bardfield, 1956
Bawden makes good use of an ornamental pattern found in the buildings and finds decorative possibilities in the pollarded and leafless trees. †
The Town Hall Yard linocut would be sold at the Zwemmer Gallery in their first (of many) ‘New Editions’ shows – a selection of prints by various printmakers. It is also believed the Ives Farm prints were also available here. The Town Hall Yard was one of the prints that ended up in the Manchester Pictures for Schools collection, it is assumed that as theirs is an Artist Proof, Bawden donated it to the Pictures for Schools scheme.
Edward Bawden – Printing the Sunday Times, 1956
The history of Printing the Sunday Times isn’t recorded, in the book The Edward Bawden Editioned Prints book by Jeremy Greenwood it is noted.
It has not been possible to discover the origin of this print, but it was perhaps commissioned by The Sunday Times whose permission at least would have been necessary to allow Bawden access to the plant.
There are a few different ideas to why this print has come about, but my theory is that is was likely commissioned by Bawden’s friend Robert Harling.
In the 1930s Harling worked for the advertising firms, Stuarts as a Designer and Everett Jones and Delamere as the Creative Director where he hired Bawden to illustrate the Fortnum and Mason catalogues. Harling was the designer who hired Eric Ravilious to design the cover to Wisden’s Cricketers’ Almanack in 1938. In 1945 Everett Jones and Delamere was liquidated and Harling moved to the staff of the Sunday Times along side Ian Fleming who was just about to write his first James Bond novel. Harling was the consultant designer to the paper from 1945 to the 80s, he would also guest at an architecture critic. In 1953 Bawden would do some illustration work for the Sunday Times for the article ‘Another Brighton’ by Clifford Musgrave (September 6th 1953).
Given that Harling was a designer for the paper and Bawden was such a close friend it could be guessed he:
Got Bawden onto the premises to make a print of the topic
Bawden saw the printing plant during the 1953 commission
Harling commissioned the print for members of the staff as an internal gift.
Edward Bawden – The Royal Pavilion, Brighton, 1956
The two prints of Brighton show a summers day and the south coast in winter. It would be the first of a series of prints and drawings Bawden made of Brighton.
Edward Bawden – Snowstorm at Brighton, 1956
Below are two illustrations for Chubb Locks, one with the full text under and a tale on how Chubb Locks can improve security, all of the adverts follow this style. Under is another line drawing.
Edward Bawden – Chubb Lock Advert, Drawn, 1956 (Published 1957)
Edward Bawden – Chubb Lock Advert, Drawn, 1956 (Published 1957)
Edward Bawden went on a working holiday to Iron Bridge with the War Artists John Nash and Carel Weight.
I was at Ironbridge for about six weeks in September and October 1956 and was joined by John Aldridge, John Nash and Carel Weight. Each of us in turn painted the famous bridge’. ‘Houses at Ironbridge was almost the last painting I was able to do during my stay. ‡
Edward Bawden. Houses at Ironbridge
Edward Bawden – Iron Bridge, 1956
Edward Bawden – The House at Ironbridge, 1956
Edward Bawden – Ironbridge Church, 1956
Back at home in Essex Bawden painted Lindsell Church twice and then would go back in 1958 to paint it again before starting a massive linocut of the church in the early 60s.
Edward Bawden – Lindsell Church, 1956
Edward Bawden – Lindsell Church #1, 1956
One of the books Bawden Illustrated as mentioned above is the Sixpence that rolled away. A curious tale by poet Louis MacNeice.
Edward Bawden’s Dust Jacket for The Sixpence that rolled away.
Edward Bawden’s illustration inside The Sixpence that rolled away
Below this are the two illustrations Bawden would make for the John Lewis book ‘A Handbook of Type & Illustration’ with an early Aesop’s print, An Old Crab & A Young Crab. Bawden would print a series of Aesop’s fable prints in the 70s.
Edward Bawden – An Old Crab & A Young Crab, 1956
The etching below was likely made for the John Lewis book as well, rather than taken from his archive. But Bawden’s style of etching remained very similar throughout his life, from the works as a student to the works he made for the Orient Line. The perspectives looked like they were forced than natural.
Edward Bawden – Watermelons, 1956
The Bawden designed chair and table in green, 1956
The strangest of the commissions to come in 1956 was again from Robert Harling and his client, Bilston Foundries Ltd. A garden seat, bench and table were designed by Bawden.
Churchill sat on it. The ‘Bilston Garden Seat’ was the brainchild of Robert Harling when he was working for an advertising agency. In a letter to Halina Graham the designer wrote, ‘The firm that produced the seat made baths, it was their main line of business & they had no faith in cast iron seats, but I remember going up to Warrington to get information about preparing the design. A technician on the staff of the Furniture School of the Royal College of Art made a model in wood of the design for casting that in itself must have been very expensive. When the seat was first produced & shown at Harrods I think that it probably failed expectations and only later when it became unobtainable did the demand for it increase’.
Bilston Foundries’ advertising leaflet describes it as ‘an ornamental seat unique in its gracefulness, and as distinguished by its careful finish as by its outstanding appearance’. The advertised price was 18 guineas. A cast iron chair along similar lines is illustrated in House and Gardens “Diction of Design”.
Edward Bawden – Flight from the Enchanter, Dust Jacket illustration, 1956.
The cover to The Flight from the Enchanter by Iris Murdoch is half made in Lino and the type and mountains are blown-up pen drawings. The original linocut is below in black, issued as a limited edition print in 1989.
Edward Bawden – Flight from the Enchanter linoblock design, 1956.
At the end of the year Bawden took part in a shared exhibition of Great Bardfield artists with Michael Rothenstein, Geoffrey Clarke and Clifford Smith from the 25th November to 7th December.
Below is a variation on the print above of An Old Crab & A Young Crab used as Edward and his wife Charlotte’s Christmas card that year.
Edward Bawden – An Old Crab & A Young Crab – Christmas Card, 1956
To finish the post off I thought what could be better than a whole run of illustrated magazine covers by Bawden for the Twentieth Century Magazine in 1956. It was in 1956 that Bawden was elected to the Royal Academy of Art. I would guess this happened in February as his credit for February is ARA and his credit for March is RA.
The font in the church shows it being the church in Great Bardfield and also featured in the King Penguin book, Life In An English Village.
The building to the right is the cottage featured in the Ives Farm print above.
Above is an illustration from Liverpool Street Station, London.
As a footnote Robert Harling wrote the book, The Drawings of Edward Bawden in 1950.
† V&A – CIRC.865-1956 Oxford Dictionary of National Biography 2005-2008 ‡ Tate – T00206
In 1949 and 1950 Edward Bawden travelled to Canada to teach at the Banff School of Fine Art during the summer. The town of Banff was first settled in the 1880s, after the transcontinental railway was built through the Bow Valley. In 1883, three Canadian Pacific Railway workers stumbled upon a series of natural hot springs on the side of Sulphur Mountain and since then the area has been a tourist attraction.
The Banff School of Fine Arts was founded in 1933 and in the 1950s they opened up classes for Opera, Photography and had summer schools with international artists visiting as teachers.
From all accounts Bawden enjoyed his time teaching there in 1949 and he returned in 1950 too. His war travels may have inspired him to take on such a commission and it was free travel too. On Bawden’s return from Canada, Walter Hoyle commented that Edward was dressed in blue denim jeans and coat, a modern fashion for such a formal chap.
While in Canada Bawden wrote to John Nash in his typical sarcastic style that he was fed up with mosquitoes and trees:
‘in my opinion nothing will ever open up this country for painting better than some forest fires on a vast scale’.†
Some of the works were featured in an exhibition in May, 1951 “Water-colour drawings of the Canadian Rockies by Edward Bawden, C.B.E., A.R.A.”
Edward Bawden – Cascade Mountain, Canadian Rockies 1949
Edward Bawden – The Bow River, Banff, Canada, 1949
Edward Bawden – A Ranch in the Rockies, 1949
Edward Bawden – The Canmore Mountain Range, 1950
While there he drove to the nearby town of Canmore, Alberta and completed a series of pictures, the watercolour above was painted in the Ukrainain Cemetry of the coal mining town. The mines opened in 1887 but during the 1970s the market price dropped and in 1979 the mines closed.
This picture painted in 1950 was done with much thicker paint and less transparent than the others. It was featured in the show at the Leicester Galleries, where the Tate purchased it. Below is the view today.
Edward Bawden – Canmore, Alberta, Canada, 1950
Edward Bawden – In the Canadian Rockies, 1949
Below is a copperplate etching made by Bawden in 1952 of his time in Canada. It would be reprinted with a set of other etchings in March 1988, to celebrate the eighty-fifth birthday of Edward Bawden.
Edward Bawden – Cabin in the Forest – Canada, 1952
† Malcolm Yorke – Edward Bawden & His Circle, 2015
The Titfield Thunderbolt is a 1953 movie by Ealing Studios. The posters were designed by Edward Bawden but so was the promotional ephemera.
The main poster for The Titfield Thunderbolt by Edward Bawden, 1953.
The main poster design might be very colourful and lively as it was the first colour comedy film Ealing Studios had produced.
This poster advertises the film produced in Britain by Ealing Studios in 1952. During the 1940s Ealing Studios commissioned artists like Edward Bawden, Edward Ardizzone and John Piper to design posters. Their illustrative, often humorous, style was quintessentially British and far removed from that of contemporary American film posters, which relied heavily on photographs of the stars as their major selling-point. Bawden ingeniously avoids a hierarchical billing of names by incorporating them equally into the steam of the engine.
The DVD Reissue for The Titfield Thunderbolt with Edward Bawden’s poster.
The Titfield Thunderbolt is a 1953 British comedy film about a group of villagers trying to keep their branch line operating after British Railways decided to close it. The film was written by T.E.B. Clarke and was inspired by the restoration of the narrow gauge Talyllyn Railway in Wales, the world’s first heritage railway run by volunteers.
A variation of the Edward Bawden poster, likely for use outside cinemas.
Along with the film poster there are also some items of paraphernalia that Bawden designed; Letterheads and promotional booklets.
An Alternative Poster – A Cheaper to Print Two-Colour Poster for inside Cinemas.
A Letter Head Design.
Above is the press-book for the Titfield Thunderbolt with an alternative drawing by Edward Bawden. I think the gardener is gesticulating a V for Victory.
The Christmas card above from 1952 was designed by Bawden to be sent from Reginald P. Baker and Michael Balcon, the films producers.
To see more Posters by British Artists that Ealing Studios produced see my previous blog on the topic here.
This post is not really connected in the typical way my articles are, but just points to a curious link between the Bardfield Artists being on Brighton Pier. I have also included a photograph by Edwin Smith – All of these artists are represented by the Fry Gallery in Saffron Walden.
A short and simple post on four drawings by Edward Bawden around King’s Lynn. Originally drawn for the Sundour Diary and Notebook in 1953.
Edward Bawden – Country Railway Station, 1953
At the station. King’s Lynn would have been a change stop for trains heading to Hunstanton, then a vibrant a popular holiday town.
Edward Bawden – Seafarers’ Wharf, 1953
The buoy and pub as they are today. The dockyards now out of use, there are less buoys and anchors than in Bawden’s time.
Edward Bawden – Ancient Warehouses, 1953
The old Bowkers warehouses, a late 18th century brick warehouse with 19th century alterations and a 1940s corn drying kiln. The warehouse was originally connected to the 15th, 17th and 18th century merchant’s house at 1 St Margaret’s Place. Most of the warehouse was demolished in 1974 and a magistrates court now stands on the site.
Below is a photograph further down the wharf with the railway carts in front on the quayside.
Marriott’s Warehouse, South Quay, King’s Lynn, c1920
Below is a drawing of the Custom House in Kings Lynn. It was designed by architect Henry Bell and built by Sir John Turner in 1683. It now houses the town’s Tourist Information Office. The building was described by architect Nikolaus Pevsner as ‘one of the most perfect buildings ever built’.
Ealing Studios have many wonderful films, but there was a period of time when they would hire fine-art artists to design promotional ephemera and posters.
A good example is for the movie ‘Painted Boats’ from 1945. The artwork for the film was designed by John Piper. The painting of the Canal boat has a graphic device painted in by Piper, like the top of a decorative headstone.
The Movie Poster for Painted Boats, 1945.
The original painting for the film poster by John Piper.
In the credit sequence of the film there is a stylised version of the graphic device used by John Piper – I am unsure if Ealing Studios gave him it to paint first, or if he painted it and they cleaned it up for the film. The backdrop to this maybe a pro-type painting used as the movies title sequence as the trees are not the same in the image above.
The posters for Ealing Studios films feature artwork by many of the era’s greatest artists including John Piper, Edward Bawden, Eric Ravilious, Edward Ardizzone and Mervyn Peake, while the acting talent is a roll-call of many of Britain’s greatest performers. †
Even when commissioned, the studio didn’t always use the artwork by the artists, ‘The Bells Go Down’, 1942 was John Pipers first work with Ealing and although paid for his efforts, they didn’t use the artwork for the poster.
The Bells Go Down, 1942. Poster prototype design by John Piper.
Ealing’s advertising department was headed up by S. John Woods, who trained as an artist and graphic designer, before working in a variety of advertising roles, including a stint at Twentieth Century Fox in the 1930s. In 1943, he joined Ealing to help realise the vision of the studio’s chief publicist, Monja Danischewsky.
Unusually for a designer working in film advertising, Woods wasn’t afraid to bring politics into the equation. Throughout the 1930s he moved in artistic circles that included Ben Nicholson, Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth, soaking up the energy and fervour of the interwar generation, cultivating a love of British abstract and surrealist art and actively contributing to exhibitions and articles challenging the established order.
Below is a curious mixture of Ealing Films own graphics department and artists work, in this case using Ronald Searle’s cartoons based on the film and using his St Trinian’s girls series.
The Lavender Hill Mob – Ealing Studios with decorations by Ronald Searle, 1951.
Below is another drawing by Ronald Searle for the Danish version of the poster. The drawing of Alex Guinness is wonderful.
Danish Poster for Masser af Guld – Lots of Gold. The Lavender Hill Mob, 1951.
The artist John Minton also made two poster designs for Ealing Studios for the movie ‘Eureka Stockade’, one landscape, one portrait. At first it might look like they are the same image cropped, but the way the man above the cartwheel handles his gun, the riders at the end of the stockade and the man with the razor-blade behind the soldier show they are not the same image, just very similar.
John Minton – Eureka Stockade, 1949
John Minton – Eureka Stockade, 1949
Here are two Posters by Edward Bawden, one for ‘Hue & Cry’ and the other is ‘The Titfield Thunderbolt’. The mixed perspectives of this and the light and dark boys used in both are wonderful. Both posters have hand-drawn typography.
Edward Bawden – Hue & Cry Poster, 1947
Edward Bawden – The Titfield Thunderbolt Poster, 1952
John Piper – Pink String and Sealing Wax Poster, 1945.
Above is the poster designed by John Piper and like in ‘Painted Boats’ the opening credits also used a similar design to the poster. The opening credits image actually comes from his ’Brighton Aquatints’ folio of prints, published in 1939. The poster must be adapted from the drawing.
John Piper – Kemp Town, 1939
† Page 2 – Press Release – Ealing Films – Light and Dark ‡ Ealing and the art of the film poster
