Eric Gill (1882-1940) is probably best known for his typeface designs – most famously, the influential Gill Sans and another created for WH Smith’s shop signage. He was also the creator of Prospero and Ariel, the sculpture that sits above the entrance to the BBC’s Broadcasting House and the Stations of the Cross (the preparatory drawings for them are pictured at the top of our mosaic) in Westminster Cathedral.
He founded the Guild of St Joseph and St Dominic, a religious Arts & Crafts commune in Ditchling, Sussex. The community embraced self-sufficiency and shunned modernity and mechanisation. He was obsessed with Catholicism and sex in equal measure; he is infamous for his extramarital affairs and sexual relations with his sisters and daughters. Despite this abhorrent behaviour, I agree with art critic, Ben Lawrence:
To separate art from the artist, to abhor his work because of what he has done, is to close your eyes to the endlessly joyous possibilities of artistic endeavour.
Prints of many of his original works are available on art.co.uk and eBay.
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