Glass Message Board
Glass Discussion & Research. NO IDENTIFICATION REQUESTS here please. => British & Irish Glass => Topic started by: 2ndhandDesign on January 12, 2010, 02:55:12 AM
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Hi. Does anyone have any images of Eric Ravilious work in glass and did he only design for stuart? cheers :mrgreen:
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I think you need to talk to Nigel Benson among others .
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I don't think he did any glass work apart from a bit for Stuart. Best known for his London Transport posters. Killed of in his prime by a war.
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Might be worth asking the family, they have a website run by Eric's grandson Ben: http://www.ericravilious.co.uk/ - has an email address for Ben there.
Designs for Stuart were done in 1934, according to Grove Art Online www.groveart.com.
This link (http://docs.google.com/viewer?a=v&q=cache:sX3cdroTdY4J:www.philip-wilson.co.uk/acatalog/images/PDF/ravillious.pdf+ravilious+stuart&hl=en&gl=uk&pid=bl&srcid=ADGEESiGGALK_4uzNtKwryF6RZHZc70Yn7lu0ZKr-v5svUnFpeKipbtRAz9Y9p6svZEl2tkE4a5kyorMfGvGvAgbwBv_AALN0sqepAfTSno2N17qUEUjYD7prCbu0Da1Q6x8-zr306PG&sig=AHIEtbRYb1LHUF7i3ciH7TcEw9xMH5jokQ) might (fingers crossed) be useful - it has one image of a Stuart decanter & glasses... (3rd page)
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Better copy of the Stuart image here:
http://www.iwm.org.uk/upload/package/37/ravilious/pop_16.htm
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Charles' book has a few photos.
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And glass between the wars i believe .
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Paul — The two most obvious sources to start with are Dodsworth, British Glass between the Wars, 1987, and Cooke, Glass — Twentieth-Century Design, 1986. Unfortunately neither work properly distinguishes between the reality of a designer's actual designs and the sales- and marketing-led promotion of signature ranges, almost certainly encouraged by demand from some of the important trade buyers.
Cooke doesn't add any Ravilious photographs, but is definitely worth reading. Both publications can be obtained secondhand, and will be available by interlibrary loan, at least in the UK and US. Both are subject to copyright, so very short quotations may be acceptable, but in this subject area short quotations would probably be misleading, as they wouldn't give you an insight into the author's strengths and weaknesses, important for a proper understanding of the material.
Cooke's list of the external designers for Stuart's display at the 1935 British Art in Industry exhibition is:
Graham Sutherland, Paul Nash, Eric Ravilious, Dod Proctor and Dame Laura Knight.
I hope that helps.
Bernard C. 8)
ps — please would you use your name more frequently, or put it in your signature block.
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Hello,
and marketing-led promotion of signature ranges, almost certainly encouraged by demand from some of the important trade buyers.
What evidence do you have for coming to that conclusion Bernard? As far as I am aware you couldn't be further from the facts. Actually, it was the trade buyers being too darn conservative that stalled the production and sales of modern cut wares in the UK. They (the trade buyers) felt comfortable with the traditional Victorian influenced designs and decided that that was what the public wanted - so that was what they bought.
In the case of cut glass, facsimile signatures were introduced by the manufacturers as a means of promoting desirable items, noteably in conjunction with the Harrods Exhibition of 1934, "Modern Art for the Table", and in the following year at the "Art in Industry" exhibition held at the Royal Academy.
In the former there were items with designs for Stuart & Sons by: Eric Ravilious, Paul Nash, Graham Sutherland, Dame Laura Knight, Vanessa Bell, Gordon Forsythe, Moira Forsythe, Ernest Procter and Dod Procter, as well as the in-house designer Ludwig Kny.
In the latter, in addition to those from the Harrods exhibition, add Keith Murray for Royal Brierley (S&W), and Clyne Farquharson for John Walsh Walsh. There is also a known design by A.E.Morris, who designed for Edinburgh and Leith, that is signed.
Apart from the last sentence, the above information is all to be found in: "Art Deco to Post Modernism, A Legacy of British Art Deco Glass", by Benson & Hayhurst - still available (see dot org website) below.
Lastly, there are a number of items by Anna Fogelberg, for Thomas Webb, that are signed - usually these are etched or engraved rather than cut.
All these 'signed' pieces were introduced at the instigation of the various manufacturers to raise the profile of their wares and to obtain promotion. Naturally, with the Harrods exhibition, since, apart from Kny, all were invited artists, it was sensible to have their designs signed, as if imitating art, so giving the work gravitas.
The above also answers the original question, there is no evidence to date that Ravilious designed for any other glass company, but Stuart & Sons.
Nigel
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Wow thanks to everyone for your info. I have been a fan of ravilious's work for some time now, more his designs for wedgwood admittedly, but its always good to see examples of other work.
cheers :cheers:
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If anything stimulated that 1935 exhibition, it was the 1925 Paris exhibition and a later UK government report on the exhibition which blasted UK glassmakers for not making better use of designers. That the continuation from that was a bit bumpy shows that, perhaps, they gave it a go to silence critics and then went back to the way things were. But also that was still early days for the industrial designer discipline as far British glass was concerned. How different it is today, where only a designer 'name' seems to matter and quality often a victim. Bernard's assumption may be a little off beam in that instance but it has become the way of the world.
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If anything stimulated that 1935 exhibition, it was the 1925 Paris exhibition and a later UK government report on the exhibition
Quite right Frank, a useful extra comment, which I ommitted to put into my previous posting. That posting was written to help avoid an assumption becoming a fact - via Chinese whispers, as-it-were.
The cut glass work from both the exhibitions was critically acclaimed, but sadly, not bought by the trade buyers, who were far more conservative in there attitude.
Nigel