Edward Bawden
Bedford Gallery, Castle Lane, Bedford, until 31 January 2010
In these days when museums seem to think it acceptable to sell off the charitable gifts of past ages to feed contemporary vanities, I wonder who will be tempted to donate works of art without binding them securely in protective red tape? In the last eight years before his death, the artist and illustrator Edward Bawden (1903–89) gave a vast archive of his work to the Cecil Higgins Art Gallery in Bedford. It was, effectively, the contents of his studio, representing nearly every period of his career, and it numbers more than 3,000 items. The Cecil Higgins is currently closed for renovation but the Bedford museum authorities have been busy, publishing a handsome illustrated book of the archive (£25 in hardback), and organising a potent selection from it into a highly effective exhibition at the Bedford Gallery.
Bawden was a superb printmaker and in particular a master of the linocut, as can be seen here in his big ambitious compositions of Brighton Pier, Liverpool Street Station and the Pagoda at Kew.
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