The Cathedral 1921 |
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Original woodcut.
Signed in ink.
Ref: Ginner 4
S 440 x 362 mm; I 303 x 257 mm
SOLD
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Ginner’s greatest print – exceptionally rare. Charles Ginner recorded selling only 3 impressions of this print and no other uncoloured proof appears to be recorded.
One of the great modernist prints of the period.
Charles Ginner made only eleven original prints, all of which were woodcuts – The Cathedral is the largest and by far the most striking of these highly stylised works. Ginner’s fourth print, created in 1921, the bold modern design of The Cathedral with its almost surreal sense of scale places it far ahead of its time in artistic terms.
Charles Ginner was one of the leading figures of the Camden Town Group of artists – established in 1911 the Group’s members included Walter Sickert, Augustus John, Robert Bevan, Harold Gilman, Lucien Pissarro and Wyndham Lewis, to name but a few. Although women were excluded from membership, the printmaker Marjorie Sherlock was involved on the periphery of the Group. Ginner served in the Royal Army Ordnance Corps and then in Intelligence during the First World War before becoming an official war artist. C.R.W. Nevinson purchased an impression of Ginner’s first woodcut, a view of St. Jacques, Dieppe, produced in 1917.
Ginner exhibited an impression of The Cathedral at the 1924 exhibition of the Society of Printmakers at the St. George’s Gallery.
Ginner kept a meticulous record of his prints and their sales in his personal notebooks – only three sales of this print are listed in the notebooks. It was illustrated in Artwork for spring 1925 (p.159). No other uncoloured proof impression is known.
The only other impression of this print we have seen offered for sale in recent times was in the Lott & Gerrish Ltd 1985 catalogue entitled Rare Proofs and Original Prints (item no.19) when it was priced at £1,000 and shown at the first London Original Print Fair.
The British Museum impression of The Cathedral (1982-6-19-19) was exhibited in their Avant-Garde British Printmaking 1914-1960 exhibition in 1990 (item no.48, illustrated and described on p.69 of the catalogue).
On pale cream laid paper with windmill watermark, with full margins. Very good original condition. |
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