Edward Ardizzone: Artist and Illustrator

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In 1929, Ardizzone had married Catherine Josephine Berkley Anderson (1904-1992) and the couple had two sons and a daughter. Ardizzone’s intimate, gently humorous drawing style made him able to humanise the events of the war through his work. Miroslav Sasek This is Sasek: Miroslav Sasek (1916-1980) (or Meer-oh-slahf Sah-sek as pronounced, and written Ŝaŝek, but best known by his drawn signature: ‘M.

His legacy persists through the many publications that remain in print bearing his compassionate imagery. Ardizzone always maintained that the art of a children’s book illustrator was particularly good when it was created as much for the child within the illustrator, as for the child viewing the illustrations. After spending six months at a commerce college in Bath, Ardizzone spent several years working as an office clerk in both Warminster and London, where he began taking evening classes at the Westminster School of Art, which were taught by Bernard Meninsky. Whilst his father stayed in the Far East working for the Eastern Extension Telegraph Company, his mother brought the five year old Edward to live in England.Today his work still resonates for many, evoking a gentle and comforting portrayal of British national identity during the Second World War. Yates joined the RAF (1941) and was stationed first in Wales and then in Ireland, before embarking for Versailles just outside of Paris (1944). For the 50th anniversary of the Medal in 2005, the book was named one of the top ten winning titles, selected by a panel to compose the ballot for public election of an all-time favourite.

Ardizzone and other war artists such as Anthony Gross, Edward Bawden, Thomas Hennell, Carel Weight and Leslie Cole gave home audiences a sense of what life was like for British troops overseas. In it he established an illustrative style that continued throughout his later work and has endured ever since: each line, thick and generous, was put down with both thoughtfulness and ease, resulting in images that are at once carefree and confident but which retain above all else an empathy with their characters. Born in Haiphong, Indo-China, Ardizzone – whose work was sometimes signed DIZ or E A – studied art under Bernard Meninsky and F J Porter at evening classes at Westminster School of Art in 1920–1. I had seen nothing more vital and essentially ‘modern’ in the best sense of the word than the reproductions in this book…(1).Underwood was born in London, eldest child to Theodore George Black Underwood, a print dealer and numismatist, and his wife Rose Ellen Cornelius who supplemented the family income as a dressmaker. The meticulous draftmanship insisted on by Tonks stood his pupils in good stead, and two of Shephard’s contemporaries, Coldstream and Rodgers, with whom he shared more than one group-show, founded the Euston Road School of Drawing and Painting in 1937.

And one of the greatest children’s illustrators himself, Maurice Sendak, declares the books…’the saltiest and most satisfying picture books created…’. Edward Wadsworth A major figure in British art of the first half of the twentieth century, Edward Wadsworth was a painter, printmaker, draughtsman and muralist.The ‘Phoney War’ came to a dramatic end when Germany launched attacks on France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg on 10 May. Stanley Spencer One of Britain’s most significant painters, Sir Stanley Spencer is celebrated for his garden landscapes, his raw depictions of personal life and his interpretations of biblical narrative – all set in his beloved birthplace, the village of Cookham, Berkshire. The year 1929 also saw Ardizzone's marriage, the birth of his first child, and (a little under a year later) his first one-man show at the Bloomsbury Gallery, followed by several at the Leger Gallery over the next few years.