Friday’s Library Snapshot … Colour Woodcuts

I was drawn by these images in an offprint from the journal The Studio 1955.  The article was written by Peter Floud who organised an international exhibition of colour woodcuts at the Victoria and Albert Museum in January 1955.

He discusses the fall in interest in woodcuts between the wars; blaming in part the interest in colour linocut as a recognised graphic medium for the teaching of children.  He suggests that by association colour woodcut lost it status as a serious medium for the adult artist.
There were 200 prints in the exhibition from Europe and America by artists who had established reputations in their own countries and it was hoped that after they been seen in other cities in Britain they would earn international acclaim and stimulate new interest in the colour woodcut and it potentialities as a graphic medium.