Harris Schrank Fine Prints

Cyril Power (1872-1951) color linoleum cut, Monseignor St. Thomas, circa 1931, signed and titled in pencil at the lower right, apart from the edition of 60. Reference: Redfern 24. In very good condition, on buff oriental laid tissue, conservation matted, with margins, 13 7/8 x 11 1/8, the sheet 15 x 12 5/8 inches.

A fine impression, with the colors fresh and vivid. Printed in four colors (yellow, red, blue and dark blue).

The prints of the Grosvenor School artists were created by applying colors with successive blocks. The margins show the colors of each of these blocks (see illustration of the margin).

The subject matter of this print relates to TS Eliot’s play “Murder in the Cathedral”; it depicts the murder itself.

Power, an architect, painter, etcher and color linocut artist, was to achieve fame as the most important of the Grosvenor School artists.  These artists, including Sybil Andrews, who worked closely with Power, were essentially applying the technique of the color linocut to the Futurist idiom – a movement brought to Britain via Italy by linocut adherent Claude Flight. Power was teaching architecture at the school in the 1920’s when the linocut movement hit. In 1912 he had published a three volume History of English Mediaeval Architecture illustrated with his own drawings.