Edward Carter Preston 1885-1965: Sculptor, Painter, Medallist

E DWA R D C A RT E R P R E S TO N

E DWA R D C A RT E R P R E S TO N 1885 - 1965 sculptor • painter • medallist

edited by A NN C OMPTON

Art Gallery University of Liverpool

Published by the University of Liverpool Art Collections to accompany the exhibition Edward Carter Preston 1885 - 1965 University of Liverpool Art Gallery 19 March to 16 July 1999 Cover Illustrations: top tomb effigy of Cardinal Gasquet, Downside Abbey lower Europa back Next-of-Kin Memorial plaque frontispiece detail of tomb effigy of Cardinal Gasquet, Downside Abbey Illustrations of works by Gerard Chowne (page 21) and Edmund C. Thompson (page 38) by kind permission of The Board of Trustees of the National Museums & Galleries on Merseyside (Walker Art Gallery) ISBN Number 0 85323 792 1 distributed by Liverpool University Press The right of Ann Compton, Cecilia Crighton, Keith Sugden, Phyllis Stoddart, Joseph Sharples and Michael Pugh Thomas to be identified as the authors of this work have been asserted by them in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988 Design Vivienne Palfreyman The exhibition and publication are supported by The Henry Moore Foundation The Granada Foundation The Friends of the University of Liverpool Liverpool John Moores University

The Henry Moore Foundation

JMU Liverpool John Moores University

T H E

G R A N A D A

F O U N D A T I O N

FOREWORD

This is the first occasion on which the range of Edward Carter Preston’s artistic achievements have been celebrated in an exhibition and publication. A painter, medallist and sculptor, he was also a craftsman of considerable skill in a range of other media from the witty and popular ‘plychrome’ figures to furniture and calligraphy. That his art is not more widely known reflects the fact that much of his time was absorbed in making sixty sculptures for Liverpool’s Anglican Cathedral and completing numerous commissions for medals. Historically, neither public sculpture nor medallic work have attracted much critical attention. In addition, Carter Preston has been perceived rather narrowly as a ‘Liverpool sculptor’. Although the label fits to the extent he lived in or near the city all his life, in terms of his artistic practice it is less so, as he completed significant sculpture commissions in Bath, Cambridge and Exeter, he also worked closely with the Royal Mint and John Pinches in London on medal commissions. The current increase in interest in the study of sculpture, and particularly public sculpture, favours a fresh appraisal of Edward Carter Preston’s work. The University of Liverpool is privileged to host this event. There is a particular appropriateness in holding the exhibition in the University Art Gallery at 3 Abercromby Square because for more than thirty years Carter Preston lived and worked a few doors away at 88 Bedford Street (now housing the University’s Department of Latin American Studies). In 1954 the University awarded an honorary Master of Arts degree to Carter Preston in recognition of his work. At the same ceremony the University conferred a Doctor of Laws on his close friend, Dean Dwelly. It had been through Dean Dwelly that Carter Preston had met Sir Giles Gilbert Scott from which stemmed a long and fruitful partnership on the Cathedral and other sculpture. This exhibition has been made possible with the help and support of a great many people. I would like to begin by thanking all the contributors to the catalogue: Cecilia Crighton, Liverpool John Moores University; Joseph Sharples, National Museums & Galleries on Merseyside (Walker Art Gallery); Phyllis Stoddart and Keith Sugden, The Manchester Museum; and Michael Pugh Thomas. They all gave their time generously on top of other work commitments to researching and writing their articles. The design and presentation of the catalogue is the hard work of Vivienne Palfreyman, for which I am very grateful. The technical presentation of the exhibition display has been achieved with characteristic accomplishment by Matthew Clough and John Welsh. Publicity and general administrative back-up has been

5

provided with the usual attention to detail and good humour by Carole Clarke. Dr. Penelope Curtis, Director of the Henry Moore Institute was most helpful and encouraging at an early stage. Advice on a variety of matters, particularly educational, has been given freely and generously by Anne MacPhee. The educational events programme also received valuable input from Toby Jackson and Catherine Orbach from Tate Gallery Liverpool at an early stage. The realisation of this programme is due to Fiona Ward who is giving a number of talks during the exhibition and has written a most useful guide to Carter Preston’s Cathedral sculpture. The co-ordination of information between this exhibition and the retrospective of Julia Carter Preston’s ceramics at the Walker Art Gallery, which coincides with it, has been facilitated by Julian Treuherz, Robin Emmerson and Myra Brown. There has been a valuable exchange of information with Liverpool Cathedral at various stages for which I am most grateful. Canon Noel Vincent requires special mention for his support in organising the loans of the maquettes. In addition Peter Kennerley and his assistant on the education team were a fund of information and support. Maurice Bray was also most helpful in providing technical details. Of course no exhibition would be possible without the generosity of the lenders. I am therefore particularly grateful to the Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral, J.G. Gow, Ryan Wood Antiques, John Vaughan, various private collectors and above all the Estate of Edward Carter Preston. A number of grants have been made to the University Art Collections in support of the exhibition, the events programme and the publication of the catalogue. In this regard I would like to express my warmest thanks to Liverpool John Mooores University, the Granada Foundation, the Friends of the University of Liverpool and the Henry Moore Foundation. It is entirely due to their backing that this exhibition and catalogue are being presented by University of Liverpool Art Collections. The conception of the exhibition arose from a conversation between Julia Carter Preston and myself in 1996. It is hard to find the words to express the unstinting support, invaluable information, apt comment, not to mention hospitality, that both she and her husband, Michael Pugh Thomas have given throughout the planning of the exhibition. The same generous attitude, willingness to provide information and warm hospitality has been extended by Mrs. Sheila Evans, Mr. and Mrs. Childs, Mrs. Irene Hopkins and Mrs. Eileen Harper. After visiting all these people I came to feel I had gained a small glimpse of the open house kept by Edward and Marie Carter Preston at 88 Bedford Street South. Altogether, working on the exhibition has given me a privileged insight into the art and life of Edward Carter Preston, I am most grateful to all who have made this possible.

A NN C OMPTON Curator, University of Liverpool Art Collections January 1999 6

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

5

Ann Compton

A FAMILY PERSPECTIVE

9

Michael Pugh Thomas

FROM SIGNWRITER TO CATHEDRAL SCULPTOR

19

Joseph Sharples

THE ARTIST AS MEDALLIST

43

Keith Sugden and Phyllis Stoddart

PRIVATE PLEASURES

55

Cecilia Crighton

LIST OF EXHIBITS

69

7

EDWARD CARTER PRESTON

8

A FA M I LY P E R S P E C T I V E by Michael Pugh Thomas

I

t was not until the late nineteen fifties that I enjoyed the privilege of meeting and then getting to know Edward Carter Preston. He was both a man of sharp and developed intellect and a polymath at a time when universality of interest had become unfashionable. Not only did he have an extraordinary range of abilities as an artist but also a great breadth of knowledge and understanding. At one of our first meetings, on learning that I had graduated in Zoology, I was drawn into a deep discussion of comparative anatomy. Later he questioned me on the form and function of organisms and the process of evolution. All discussions which sorely taxed my knowledge of the topics and would have similarly stimulated my zoological colleagues. Gradually I came to appreciate the many facets of this exceptional man. I soon also became aware that, in the words of the late Bishop Augustus David of Liverpool, Carter Preston was ‘the finest kind of agnostic’. A free thinker and a person deeply interested and concerned with the welfare of humanity. In this latter respect, he followed in a family tradition, his grandfather, a former Lord Mayor of Liverpool having funded the construction of St. Margaret’s Church and School in Anfield. Edward Carter Preston was born on 7 July 1885 into a well-established family of Liverpool brewers. The family, however, had a long history as farmer/landowners in North Lancashire, where it is possible to trace the lineage back to 1306. It was not until late in the eighteenth or early in the nineteenth century that the first members of the family came to Liverpool where they founded the brewing firm, Robert Preston in Vauxhall Road. Edward was born into a house in Walton, then on the outskirts of Liverpool and in almost rural surroundings. It is reasonable to surmise that early in life he began to observe the animals and plants surrounding his home and thus started to develop his skills in using natural forms in his work as an artist. Although the family was well placed, he and his six brothers and sisters were all expected to contribute to the household’s well being before even going to school. Dogs had to be combed, fed and walked. Horses, including large shires which were bred by his father and were kept both for pleasure and transport, groomed, fed and watered. A love of shire horses and dogs remained with Edward throughout his life. This affinity for animals later emerged in his medals, sculpture and stained glass in beautifully observed representations of dogs and other creatures. A spirit of Victorian self reliance was instilled into all the children at an early stage in their lives. An active participation in the arts did not, however, form part of his personal development process and Edward’s early efforts at painting were not encouraged. In an exchange well recorded in family tradition his father said: ‘Painting watercolours is for ladies, it’s

9

Title page • BOOK

10

OF

REMEMBRANCE • King’s Liverpool Regiment

no way for a man to earn a living.’ Thus, at the age of eighteen when his father told him that, if he was determined to be an artist he had better leave home and see if he could make a living painting pictures, it did not come as a surprise. Earn a living as an artist he certainly did, but not within the narrow confines of his father’s ideas. On one occasion he painted a huge OXO advertisement on the gable end of a house. He also spent many patient hours making large coloured diagrams of diseased eyes for the eye specialist, Bickerton, of Rodney Street, a person who became a long standing friend. For several years he worked for Morton’s, a firm of interior decorators and fitters, where he undertook a wide range of jobs including interior designs. This enabled him to become accomplished in a variety of techniques, many of which he used throughout his life. At the same time, he taught ‘art’ at a ladies college which he found neither enjoyable or artistically satisfying. In order to enhance his skills further he enrolled in the University of Liverpool Department of Applied Arts, known locally as the ‘Art Sheds’ where, amongst others he came under the tutelage of Augustus John. John’s influence is clear in much of Carter Preston’s very early work, for instance in his early drawings and silk paintings but he soon began to establish his own style. Also, in order to understand human anatomy he spent time in the dissecting rooms of the Anatomy Department, time which was invaluable in relation to his figure painting, sculpture and medal work. It was while at the ‘Art Sheds’ that he met fellow Liverpool sculptor, Herbert Tyson Smith. Edward was soon invited home to Tyson Smith’s for supper. Here he met and later married Herbert’s sister, Marie, who was a very capable water-colourist. Carter Preston had suffered from rheumatoid arthritis early in life and was unfit for military service in the First World War. He started married life in Elizabeth Street but soon moved to 155 Canning Street with an extended family. On the death of his father he had assumed responsibility for his brothers and sisters, several of whom either became artists or married artists. His brother, Albert Preston, worked as a manuscript illuminator and commercial artist. Edward and Albert worked together on the King’s Liverpool Regiment Book of Remembrance for the Second World War which is held in Liverpool Cathedral. This work was done shortly after the end of the war when gold leaf was virtually unobtainable and family gold rings had to be beaten into leaf for the more elaborate letters and decorative details. In the early years of the century he had become interested in the design of medals and won the competition for the Next–of-Kin plaque awarded to relatives of those who died in the First World War and used again after the Second World War. His interest in matters outside of the arts is again illustrated by the fact that he heard of his success when experimenting with a cats-whisker radio on the kitchen table in Canning Street. The broadcast came through once and then the radio failed. Shortly after the First War, he became involved with the work of the Lord Roberts Workshops in trying to rehabilitate severely injured troops, many of whom had lost arms and legs. He invented a series of multilayer plywood figures which the men could cut out on jig saws and then assemble and paint. These ‘plychrome’ figures became very popular with the men, particularly as many of the designs were caricatures of well known military personnel. It was not, however, until the twenties that he took sculpture seriously. An early work being the commemorative statue for the World Scout Jamboree held in Arrowe Park, Birkenhead in 1929. Since 1905, he had worked in the Sandon Terrace Studios at 9, Sandon Terrace, Liverpool where he

11

Obverse of WAR MEDAL 1939-45

12

MIRROR commissioned by J.G. Gow

13

left THE LOST PIECE OF SILVER • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5 right CHARITY • North Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5

14

was one of a group of working artists. In the early twenties the Sandon Studios transferred to the Bluecoat Chambers and Edward Carter Preston was one of the dedicated group who set up the Bluecoat Society of Arts and who were instrumental in saving the building from almost certain demolition. In 1931, he became sculptor to the Anglican Cathedral and moved his studio to the newly acquired family house at 88, Bedford Street South where the stabling was converted into a large and well lit studio. His connection with the Cathedral arose through the late Dean Dwelly and the two men formed a life-long and close friendship. The Cathedral work extended from 1931 through to the carving of the Dwelly memorial in the late fifties. As the two men had been such close friends Carter Preston found working on this memorial and particularly the taking of Dwelly’s death mask exceptionally harrowing. Throughout this period there had also been a steady stream of medal designs both for the royal mint and for private commissions. Other sculptures were commissioned for Downside Abbey, Cambridge University Library and Exeter Cathedral as well as private individuals. It is often forgotten that Edward Carter Preston was a superb letter carver and adept at helping to devise suitable wording for inscriptions. Reading the inscriptions in the Cathedral, often written jointly by Dwelly and Carter Preston, is an additional pleasure to looking at the memorials themselves. As the studio was in the garden of the family house, which was also the centre of the business, there was a steady stream of visitors ranging from senior churchmen and judges to family friends. They provided a lively intellectual atmosphere but one totally lacking in affectation. Edward and Marie’s youngest daughter, Julia, clearly remembers a lengthy and detailed discussion of the problems then shared by children and bishops in doing up the multiple buttons on gaiters. There was a close working relationship within the household made up of Marie, the four children and the family help, Mary Ferri. Taking tea to the studio often incurred the risk of being drawn upon to act as a quick model for difficult pieces of sculpture. Julia well recalls acting on such occasions with pieces of wet cloth over her arm so as to aid the modelling of draperies. A walk around the Cathedral can be a walk around the family with interpretations of Marie, Julia, the family dog and others. This short essay started with personal recollections and finishes in the same way with a personal view of Edward Carter Preston, sculptor, painter, medallist but most of all a lively alert and forward looking personality. This was typified by a project he was working on just before he died for a thirty five foot high figure of Christ in a new medium, fibreglass. The sculpture was for a church tower which could not support the weight of a carving in stone. ‘Exegi monumentum aere perennius,’( Horace, Odes III xxix. 12). ‘My work is done, the memorial more enduring than brass’ could have been said of Carter Preston. The memory of the man, himself, is more perishable but may be glimpsed through the honesty and integrity of his work.

15

HELEN SWIFT NEILSON MEMORIAL 1948

16

17

CARDINAL GASQUET tomb effigy • Downside Abbey 1931-2

VIEW OF CHOIR AND EASTERN TRANSEPT • Liverpool Cathedral

18

FROM SIGNWRITER TO CATHEDRAL SCULPTOR by Joseph Sharples

E

dward Carter Preston was born in Liverpool in 1885 and died there in 1965. His long career as a painter, sculptor, medallist and craftsman began during a remarkable period of local creativity in the early 1900s and ended, somewhat incongruously, in the era of a very different Merseyside renaissance. In the intervening years he was one of the most productive artists in the city, and in the sculpture he made for the Anglican cathedral he was responsible for one of the most ambitious programmes of twentieth-century architectural decoration in the country. Carter Preston did not come from an artistic family - his ancestors for several generations back were stock-breeders - so in choosing the career he did he was swimming against the tide of parental expectation. His earliest training1 was as an apprentice with E.R. Latham of Renshaw Street, a firm specialising in the decorative use of glass, where he learnt sign writing, gilding and engraving, and it is not difficult to see the legacy of this in his mature work with its sure command of two dimensional design and its skilful deployment of lettering. From Latham’s he went to the large furnishing firm Morton’s, and he is also said to have attended an unorthodox private art school run by a Mrs. Daniels, but it was as a student at the Liverpool University School of Applied Art from 1902 to 1905 that his artistic horizons were significantly broadened. This school,2 known affectionately as the ‘Art Sheds’ because it occupied an unprepossessing group of temporary timber buildings, was allied to the University School of Architecture. It was one of a small number of art schools which aimed to put into practice the ideals of the Arts and Crafts movement as originally preached by John Ruskin and William Morris and subsequently taken up by W.R. Lethaby, by combining the study of architecture with the practical teaching of traditional craft skills. Carter Preston enrolled at the ‘Art Sheds’ at the age of 18 in the summer term of 1902, and took three evening classes a week in modelling. Over the following years he added classes in painting and drawing and decorative design, progressing from study of the Antique to the Life class, until in 1904-5 he was attending the School for four full days and two or three evenings a week. The evening classes were free but the day classes had to be paid for, and the School register shows that he was still employed during this period, giving his occupation variously as decorator, glass decorator, and signwriter.3 The outstanding personality on the School’s staff during this time was Augustus John, whose technical brilliance and unrestrained bohemian character underline the contrast between the young Carter Preston’s new environment and his earlier experience as an apprentice tradesman.

19

More significant for the later development of his art, however, was Charles John Allen (1862-1956) who taught him modelling and sculpture. Allen had worked as Hamo Thornycroft’s assistant before taking up his post in Liverpool and was an exponent of the New Sculpture, enlivening his classical and mythological subjects with naturalistic and expressive modelling and undertaking commissions for the richly symbolic sculptural decoration of buildings. In the years around 1900 when Carter Preston studied under him, Allen carried out several ambitious schemes of architectural sculpture in Liverpool - panels for the exterior of St. George’s Hall, a frieze on the Royal Insurance Building in Dale Street, the bronze figure groups on the Victoria Monument, and the interior plasterwork of the Philharmonic Hotel on Hope Street - and the younger man was no doubt familiar with these object lessons in the harmonising of statuary and architecture. Allen was also a skilful designer of medals, a field in which Carter Preston was to excel. In 1905 the ‘Art Sheds’ ceased to exist as an independent school and was absorbed into the City School of Art. Some of its students, including Carter Preston, decided to set up a rival establishment, to be known as the Sandon Terrace Studios, and they enlisted the designer James Herbert MacNair and the painter Gerard Chowne to teach there. Speaking in 1927, Carter Preston said that he regarded Chowne as the ‘most potent influence in my life,’4 but it is not easy to see a close connection between Chowne’s characteristic flower paintings in the manner of Fantin-Latour and Carter Preston’s hard edged, brightly coloured pictures. In fact, Chowne seems to have exercised his influence not so much through the stylistic example of his own work as through encouraging his student to examine a wider range of art than he had previously considered. Specifically, he led him to look beyond Renaissance Italy and to learn from modern France. The Sandon Terrace Studios quickly developed into the Sandon Society of Artists and then into the Sandon Studios Society,5 a wide ranging and progressive arts group of which Carter Preston was to be a member for the rest of his life and in which he held various offices. It moved from Sandon Terrace to the early eighteenth-century former Blue Coat School in the city centre, where there was room for members to rent studios and hold exhibitions, as well as for the parties and social events which were such a feature of the Society’s activities. Carter Preston had his studio in the Blue Coat School until 1931, after which he worked from his house at 88 Bedford Street South, close to the cathedral. The Society aimed to play a leading role in the cultural life of the city, as one of its founders, Mrs. Hamel Calder, explained: ‘We want to stimulate the artistic and intellectual life of Liverpool by bringing together those who are interested in something more than fashion and football and bridge and the share market. We want the amateur musical enthusiast to meet the rising professional and the young composer, the collector of taste to meet the promising artist. We want all the bright, appreciative people, to meet the clever and original.’6 One of the Society’s most significant early achievements, and an expression of its opposition to the city’s art establishment as represented by the moribund Autumn Exhibitions at the Walker Art Gallery, was to bring a selection from Roger Fry’s first Post-Impressionist exhibition to Liverpool in 1911.7 The pictures were shown alongside works by Society members, and Carter Preston was on the selecting and hanging committee and was well represented in the exhibition with a total of ten watercolours, drawings and paintings. Catalogues were probably not produced for all the Society’s exhibitions - certainly only a few survive, and unfortunately there is none for the one man show which Carter Preston mounted in

20

Gerard Chowne • PINK

AND

WHITE STOCKS IN A PEWTER VASE 1908

21

above C.J. Allen • PHYSIOLOGY AND PATHOLOGY • Thompson Yates Laboratory relief 1896 below JOFFRE AND THE GALLIC COCK • ‘plychrome’ figure 1915

22

19138 - so it is difficult to get a clear idea of exactly what he was painting at this time. Watercolours on silk seem to have been one of his early enthusiasms, and to judge from surviving examples these were highly decorative, brightly coloured works with symbolist overtones. Surprisingly, he showed a number of these paintings in the much reviled Liverpool Autumn Exhibitions in 1909-12, which suggests that the selectors regarded them as ornamental rather than aggressively modern. In the setting of the Sandon Studios Society, by contrast, he could be more adventurous, as noted by a reviewer of the Society’s 1912 Exhibition of Modern Art who wrote that ‘of the members who send the most ambitious works, Mr. E.C. Preston in his “Dancers” shows the most complete assimilation of the simplification and abstract design which characterize the Post-Impressionist movement.’9 By this date he had also begun to produce the landscape watercolours which he continued to paint throughout his career, of subjects in north Wales, Merseyside, and especially north Lancashire where he had a house at Bentham near Lancaster. They show a tendency towards abstraction, and an interest in expressing the geometric shapes which underlie natural forms. In 1912 his work was also included in an exhibition by the Society of Modern Artists at the Blackfriars Academy in Manchester, where he was described as painting ‘with brilliantly elementary colours’, and where in an interview he expressed his belief that ‘the ideal of the modern artist was to get past the material side of things and express the spiritual side. His aim was to dream dreams on canvas.’10 This high-minded view of the artist’s role was dealt a rude blow by the outbreak of war in 1914. The market for paintings dried up, and Carter Preston, declared unfit for military service, was obliged to diversify. He devised a technique for making small statuettes out of plywood, first cutting out the flat shape of a figure then sandwiching a number of these shapes together and painting them in colours of heraldic brightness to make small, three dimensional sculptures, toylike in form but sophisticated in subject matter. The materials were inexpensive and the sculptures, priced at between two shillings and five pounds, could be easily duplicated. The technique lent itself particularly well to the making of caricatures, and in June 1915 an exhibition of these ‘plychrome’ models and statuettes was held at the Fine Art Society in London which included several caricatures of military and political leaders of the day as well as figures from classical mythology and fantastic animals. The catalogue11 had a foreword by J.G. Legge, Liverpool Corporation’s Director of Education and a prominent Sandon member, in which he described Carter Preston as ‘one of several Liverpool artists working out their own ideas of art and craftsmanship in complete freedom from academic, bureaucratic or communal control, the A.B.C. of disappointing Art.’ Possibly as a result of the success of his ‘plychrome’ models, Carter Preston started designing furniture and other objects for manufacture by the Lord Roberts Memorial Workshops which provided sheltered employment for veterans. The War did not only impose constraints on artists, it also presented new opportunities. The demand for war memorials kept a generation of sculptors in work while the same urge to commemorate victory and bereavement resulted in numerous commissions for medals, and for Carter Preston this turned out to be the springboard from which his future career was launched. He designed a small number of war memorials, of which the most ambitious was a free-standing bronze figure for the head office of the Elder Dempster Line shipping company,12 but in the field of medal design he was prolific. In collaboration with his brother-in-law, Herbert Tyson Smith, he had 23

entered the 1916 competition for a medal to commemorate the Battle of Jutland Bank, but it was his independent success in the 1918 contest for the Next-of-Kin plaque, which he won out of a field of eight hundred entrants, that established his reputation. The plaque was intended for presentation to the next of kin of all those who lost their lives in the War and was described as ‘the most universally-distributed numismatic work ever cast or struck - excluding money.’13 The Greekinfluenced severity of Carter Preston’s winning design reflected his belief that such memorial medals should be ‘free from morbid sentimentality,’14 and this austerity was to be characteristic of his subsequent figurative sculpture. Throughout the 1920s and beyond he designed a great number of medals for military and civilian purposes and became well practised in tailoring his work to the precise terms of a commission, devising complicated schemes of symbolism, and dealing with the demands of clients who were not expert in matters of art. These skills were to be of considerable importance in the major project of his career, the programme of sculpture for Liverpool Cathedral which occupied him from 1930 until 1960. The ‘east’ end of Giles Gilbert Scott’s immense cathedral was complete as far as the ‘eastern’ transept by 1924, and work then started on the great central space above which the tower would later rise, and on the ‘western’ transept beyond. Sculpture is an important element in Scott’s idiosyncratic brand of gothic, in which large areas of sheer wall are relieved at intervals by tightly concentrated patches of decoration, and a number of carvers were employed on the first phase of the building. The principal craftsman seems to have been Joseph Phillips, but other notable contributors were William Gough who carved the reredos in the Holy Spirit chapel to Scott’s design, Lillie Reed who was responsible for the exterior porch of the Lady Chapel, and Louis Weingartner and Walter Gilbert who did the great reredos in the choir.15 With the exception of the choir reredos, which has an almost Byzantine formality, most of this sculpture is fairly typical of the late gothic revival: essentially naturalistic, with deep undercutting of the voluminous draperies producing strong contrasts of light and shade and giving some sense of animation. Years later, Scott expressed his dissatisfaction with this early sculpture.16 What he thought of it at the time is unclear, but in 1928 he chose to employ a new young artist, David Evans, a former Rome Scholar in sculpture whose work was much more austere and simple, and arguably more in tune with Scott’s architecture.17 It seems likely that Scott saw the commencement of the second phase of his cathedral as an opportunity to make a new start, finally shaking off the Victorian influence of G.F. Bodley which had dominated the project at the outset. Unfortunately Evans had only completed two works, a relief in the Lady Chapel to the memory of nurses who died in the War and the model for Bishop Chavasse’s monument, when he decided to leave Liverpool for New York, and it was at exactly this stage that Carter Preston was brought to Scott’s attention by Frederick William Dwelly, Dean of Liverpool. Evans, it seems, was to have made a recumbent effigy of Bishop Ryle for the cathedral, and following his departure the commission was given to Carter Preston instead, even though he appears to have done very little large scale sculpture before this date. The Ryle monument set the tone for all Carter Preston’s subsequent work in the cathedral: inspired by gothic examples in its general shape but very much of the 1930s in its stylised treatment, and embodying iconographic details which were the result of independent thought and careful research by the sculptor. The most striking feature of the design is the group of symbols of the evangelists on which the Bishop’s feet rest. Carter Preston wrote to Scott that he intended

24

left ITHURIEL • Transept windows, Liverpool Cathedral 1931-2 right RAPHAEL AND TOBIT • Transept windows, Liverpool Cathedral 1931-2

25

left TEMPERANCE • North Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5 right FORTITUDE • North Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5

26

left PHILOSOPHY • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5 right ASTRONOMY • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5

27

left ISAIAH • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1935-6 right JEREMIAH • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1935-6

28

these to illustrate that ‘the Bishop was a firm evangelical, and believed in the literal inspiration of the Word’, and that the different symbols - bull, lion and eagle - were shown ‘welded together’ because ‘this was the tenor of his writing.’18 Scott’s satisfaction with the design for the Ryle effigy led him at once to commission four more figures from Carter Preston, to stand against the interior and exterior faces of the central mullions of the big windows in the ‘western’ transept, representing the angel Raphael with the boy Tobit, St. Barnabas, the angel Ithuriel, and St. Paulinus. Carter Preston was asked to estimate separately for the cost of preparing models of the figures and for the cost of carving them in stone, with the result that Scott decided to have the carving done by the cathedral masons whose work was substantially cheaper,19 an arrangement which was to become the norm for Carter Preston’s subsequent work for the cathedral. Again the sculptor applied himself eagerly to questions of symbolism, but his preference for the obscure over the well-known began to be a source of friction with the cathedral authorities, particularly over the figure of St. Barnabas. After this particular dispute had been settled, Scott wrote to him: ‘both the Bishop and Sir Frederick [Radcliffe] hope you will not be discouraged from making further suggestions from time to time on these matters, and Sir Frederick says ...“I should be very glad to encourage the inventive faculty which we are fortunate to find in Mr.Carter Preston,” and with this I entirely agree.’20 Sir Frederick Radcliffe (1861-1953) had been a member of the Liverpool Cathedral Committee since 1901, serving as Honorary Treasurer, Vice Chairman, and from 1913 as Chairman, and following his retirement from the Chairmanship in 1934 he continued to oversee the sculptural decoration of the building. It was he who devised the themes and subjects of the sculpture for the two great entrance porches which was to be Carter Preston’s chief contribution to the building and was to occupy him throughout the 1930s. The control of this work was nominally in the hands of the Committee, but as Scott wrote to Carter Preston, consulting the Committee was really only a formality: ‘I think you can take it that there are only four people need be seriously considered in regard to aesthetic matters, viz. : Sir Frederick Radcliffe, the Dean, yourself and myself.’21 Since Scott’s office was in London and Radcliffe lived in Surrey, a triangular correspondence ensued between them and Carter Preston in which every stage of the sculptural programme was discussed. The letters have mostly survived and they make it possible to trace the history of the project in remarkable detail.22 Scott emerges as the ideal employer from an artist’s point of view. Having recognised in Carter Preston someone who was innately sympathetic to his own artistic aims for the cathedral and who was willing to subjugate his sculpture to the demands of the architectural setting, he was content to exercise minimal control, as he wrote to Radcliffe after work had been in progress for several years: ‘The figures being regarded as part of the architecture, rather than isolated examples of sculpture, is ... a point of view which Carter Preston has kept constantly before him, without the necessity for prompting on my part. I always have been, and still am, strongly in favour of leaving him, as far as possible, a free hand with these figures, and I feel he has fully justified the confidence I placed in him.’23 Radcliffe’s letters on the other hand show that he was as much concerned with content as with style, and was prepared to argue forcefully when Carter Preston’s treatment of a subject, especially his use of rather arcane symbols, seemed unsuitable. Work on the porch sculptures began inside the building with the triple doorway on the ‘north’ side of the central space below the tower. Scott’s architecture required eight figures in niches

29

flanking the doors in pairs, and a further three figures above the doors. Radcliffe proposed an iconography closely based on medieval precedents: the figures in the upper tier would represent the supernatural virtues, Faith, Hope and Charity, while the lower tier would illustrate the natural virtues, Humility, Bounty, Temperance, Justice, Prudence, Fortitude, Concord and Chastity. The lower figures would be enlivened by showing them treading under foot their corresponding vices. For the matching triple doorway on the ‘south’ side Radcliffe proposed the theme of Science and the Liberal Arts. Here the pairs of figures flanking the doors would illustrate Architecture, Painting, Music, Poetry, Astronomy, Mathematics, History and Medicine, while the upper figures would represent Theology, Philosophy and Natural Science. Radcliffe put forward these plans, along with his proposals for the two outer porches, in a memorandum dated 7 February 1933 which he sent to Carter Preston the next day,24 and although he described them only as ‘suggestions’, the finished sculptures follow them more or less precisely. A sketchbook containing pencil studies for the porch figures survives, and it is likely that drawings were used as the first stage in the design process. It is clear from the correspondence that Carter Preston then made small scale sketch models which he sent to Scott and Radcliffe for their preliminary comments. Next he made full size models in clay and sent photographs to Scott and Radcliffe, then as each model was approved he had it cast in plaster and delivered to the cathedral for the masons to carve. A notable feature of the models, clearly visible in the photographs, is that the surface of the clay is tooled to give an effect similar to chiselled stone. The strikingly columnar shape of the figures was largely determined by the narrow spaces they had to occupy in Scott’s architecture, following medieval examples. The exterior figures were carved away from the site and installed in their niches subsequently. However, the blocks of unworked stone for the interior figures were already built into the structure, ready to be carved in situ, so the space available to Carter Preston for these was absolutely finite, and each block contained two horizontal mortar joints which further constrained the sculptor. Not surprisingly, the style of the figures owes much to the portal sculptures of thirteenth-century French cathedrals, especially Chartres, and indeed Radcliffe sent Carter Preston copies of Emil Mâle’s L’Art Religieux du treizième siècle en France and I.E. Marriage’s The Sculpture of Chartres Cathedral, and referred to them repeatedly in his letters to the sculptor, drawing attention to relevant illustrations and passages of text.25 As at Chartres, there is little undercutting in Carter Preston’s work, and there is an emphasis on the linear pattern of drapery folds. There is also a tendency to treat the surface as a series of distinct planes, giving the figures, and especially the heads, an almost faceted appearance.26 Radcliffe’s response to Carter Preston’s work was highly favourable at first: ‘I think [the figures of Temperance and Justice] very impressive and effective. Indeed I am greatly relieved. Not that I doubted that you would do the best possible, but that I felt doubt as to the ability of this age to give us anything so well blending the old symbolism and significance with modern feeling.’27 However, it was not long before the issue of symbolism became a source of disagreement. There were to be many differences of opinion as work progressed, but the first major argument was over the figure of Hope, and it is worth describing in detail as an example of the fundamental problem underlying the cathedral commission. Carter Preston wanted to represent Hope holding an acorn ‘the seed of England’s tree... . As the cathedral is being raised during a period of spiritual as well as social evolution, or, should I say, regeneration, I felt the acorn aptly expressed the condition.’28

30

left LUKE • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1935-6 right PAUL • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1935-6

31

left SOWER • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1936-7 right SHEPHERD • South Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1936-7

32

left ST. JAMES • Font, Liverpool Cathedral right ST. MATTHEW • Font, Liverpool Cathedral

33

left EDWARD THE CONFESSOR • Sedilia figure, Exeter Cathedral 1938-9 right HOPE • North Porch, Liverpool Cathedral 1934-5

34

Radcliffe thought there was something ‘druidical’ about the acorn and suggested that an ear of wheat - a symbol familiar from the New Testament - would be more suitable, but Carter Preston thought the shape too complicated to be legible from ground level and restated his preference: ‘I could employ the wheat, but this I would be doing under compulsion as I consider the acorn does not tie the intended blessings more to the earth than would the wheat ear; they both convey the Eternal emanating from the Particular.’29 The dispute throws into relief the very different positions from which the two men approached the question: Carter Preston the independent, creative, agnostic artist, given to sometimes fanciful theorising, and Radcliffe, the practically minded churchman with an instinctive reverence for the authority of scriptural and ecclesiastical tradition. Writing to Scott, Radcliffe expressed himself bluntly on the matter: ‘One must bear in mind that [Carter Preston] has no intrinsic reaction to what is traditionally fitting with regard to questions of this kind ... We have never attempted to “compel” the artists we have employed to outrage their artistic conscience. On the other hand, we have rightly insisted, and must insist, that the subject and symbolism must be such as we approve or even dictate, so long as it is capable of artistic use ... Not being, I believe, accustomed to Church ways, the question has not struck him from our angle.’30 To Carter Preston he wrote in a manner conciliatory but equally firm: ‘It is of the utmost importance that ... [the] emblems used should have a certain familiarity to practising Christians who live by their faith... I know that you will agree that in this kind of work, meaning must come first, and that the subjects are not to be mere excuses for artistic skill, but are to control the whole.’31 Carter Preston had yielded to similar arguments from clients in his career as a medallist, but working on the cathedral he seems to have regarded his creative role more jealously. He was, after all, a spiritually-minded artist (the Bishop of Liverpool described him as ‘the finest kind of agnostic ... a kind of prophet like Blake’)32 though his spiritual outlook was not always in tune with that of a devout Anglican like Radcliffe, and on these occasions he turned instinctively to Scott as a fellow artist for support. When there were further disagreements over the statues representing Science and the Liberal Arts, with Radcliffe questioning the prevalence of female figures and the use of imagery derived from classical, pagan sources, Carter Preston wrote to Scott and staked his claim to a degree of creative independence: ‘I recognise the advisability of using signs that have become familiar through constant usage, but where there has not been a fixed image, I think the artist has usually used his judgement and applied what he felt best suited his needs. I would like to know that I had that liberty.’33 To Radcliffe, at around the same time, he drafted a letter saying that in his work for the cathedral he did not want to be a slave to tradition and that he considered it a duty ‘to live in one’s own age as Sir Giles has done in his treatment of the Gothic elements and as all artists have done who were worthy of the name.’34 In the Autumn of 1935 Carter Preston started work on the first of the two exterior porches, the Welsford porch on the ‘north’ side of the building. The Rankin porch on the ‘south’ side followed immediately afterwards. The Welsford porch looks out over the dramatic disused quarry containing St. James’s cemetery, and Radcliffe’s iconographic scheme reflects this in taking for its theme the Resurrection. Above the triple doorway the risen Christ stands between two of the angels from the Book of Revelation, while below, flanking the doors, are five Old Testament writers who prophesied the coming of Christ (Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel and David), and five New Testament writers who testified to the Resurrection (Matthew, Mark, Luke, John and Paul). Carter Preston’s treatment

35

of these subjects was uncontroversial and his models were approved almost without comment. The Rankin porch, on the other hand, was to prove more difficult. Here Radcliffe had chosen a more complex theme, the Active Life. The teaching figure of Christ presides from the upper level, between the Angel of Promise and the Angel of the Eternal Gospel from the Book of Revelations (instead of the angels the original plan was to have figures of King George V and Queen Mary in these positions.) Below, flanking the doors, are a series of ten figures from Christ’s parables, chosen with special reference to the life of the Diocese of Liverpool: Sower, Labourer, Shepherd, Fisherman or Sailor, Merchant, Manager or Clerk, Builder, Good Neighbour or Philanthropist, Housewife and Servant. Carter Preston’s main problem with the Active Life series concerned costume. Scott’s architecture required that the figures should have a strong vertical emphasis, and in all his work for the cathedral the sculptor had achieved this by dressing his figures in full length robes. However, as Radcliffe pointed out, such robes were inappropriate for several of the Rankin porch figures: ‘I know, of course, the vast importance of vertical lines; but where the whole reason of a figure is to illustrate a Trade, is it not essential to keep the costume congruous with the exercise of the Trade, if the idea is to be suggested? A shepherd could not seek a lost sheep on the hillside or a bricklayer lay bricks, or a sower sow seed etc., etc., in a robe reaching to the ground - he must have room for stooping, for digging and so forth. I am not troubled about meticulous details as if this were a historical museum, but only troubled about the difficulty of making these credible figures, suggesting their meaning to the ordinary man.’35 Carter Preston felt such mundane considerations were a distraction from the main issue, and in a draft of his reply he made it clear that his own priorities were aesthetic rather than didactic: ‘Do you think we should pay so much importance to the “ordinary man” ? I must confess that I give him very scant attention. I feel my imperative obligation is to the building but I try to be as simple & direct as possible both in the meaning and the form, and hope by removing all extravagance in either to give something that can be of interest to all.’36 The figure that caused most trouble was the Servant, and in the end Carter Preston’s longrobed design was only accepted on the understanding that it illustrated the higher class servant from Luke XII, 35-38, who might conceivably have worn such a garment, rather than the humbler one from Luke XVII, 7-10, which had been Radcliffe’s original intention. In the end, Carter Preston got away with using full length robes for all but one of the figures in the series. As well as architectural sculpture Carter Preston produced a number of items on a smaller scale for the cathedral - inscriptions, memorial tablets, the baptismal font - which include some of his most beautiful works. These were not only designed by the sculptor but also carved by him, and this fact, combined with their materials - Hopton Wood stone for the tablets, and a particularly beautiful marble called Lunel Rubane for the font - gives them a subtle and sensuous quality which the porch figures, cut with the aid of a pointing machine in coarse grained Woolton stone, conspicuously lack. The reliefs also demonstrate Carter Preston’s ability as a designer in two dimensions, developed through many years of experience in the design of medals. The memorial tablet to Helen Swift Neilsen in the Lady Chapel, depicting a group of seated female musicians in a manner inspired by late medieval or early renaissance models, is particularly graceful, while the tablets to the orthopaedic surgeon Robert Jones and to Dr. A.J.M. Melly show Carter Preston’s skill in representing thoroughly modern subjects - the doctor’s surgery and the twentieth-century

36

VIEW OF RANKIN PORCH • Liverpool Cathedral

37

Edmund C. Thompson • BOYHOOD

38

OF

APOLLO • relief in foyer of Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool 1938-9

battlefield - in a timeless way which does not jar with the architectural setting. The fact that Carter Preston was responsible for so many of the monuments and commemorative inscriptions in the building helped Scott to achieve the unity and consistency which he sought in the overall appearance of the interior, and the success of their working relationship on the cathedral led to further collaborations. Scott commissioned him to carve the recumbent effigy of Cardinal Gasquet for Downside Abbey,37 figures of Edward the Confessor, Bishop Leofric and Queen Edytha for niches above the sedilia of Exeter Cathedral, and four large figures representing the winds to stand at the corners of the tower of Cambridge University library. The years between the two world wars were a rich period for architectural sculpture in Liverpool, and it is worth considering Carter Preston’s work at the cathedral in its wider local context. The outstanding architectural sculptor of these years was Carter Preston’s brother-in-law, Herbert Tyson Smith, who worked in a rather severe, flat, classically-derived style which perfectly complemented the American-influenced Beaux-Arts buildings then being put up by graduates of Charles Reilly’s Liverpool School of Architecture. At exactly the time that Carter Preston was starting work on the cathedral, Tyson Smith was busy covering Herbert Rowse’s palatial new headquarters for Martins Bank in Water Street with mermaids, dolphins and other symbols of Liverpool’s maritime prosperity. He was assisted by George Capstick and Edmund C. Thompson, who in the mid-1930s did the Art Deco sculpture on Rowse’s ventilating towers and entrances for the first Mersey Tunnel - wonderfully suggestive of speed and mechanical efficiency - and the reliefs in the foyer and auditorium of his Philharmonic Hall. Notable sculptors from beyond Merseyside who worked on Liverpool buildings at this time were James Woodford and John Skeaping, responsible respectively for the bronze doors and the frieze of Minoprio & Spencely’s School for the Blind in Hardman Street, and Edward Bainbridge Copnall who taught at the Art School and produced carvings for the churches of St. Christopher in Norris Green, St. Columba in Anfield, and St. Hugh in Edge Hill. Carter Preston’s sculpture for the cathedral stands apart from all these, not being overtly concerned with contemporary life in its subject matter, and appearing neither voguishly ‘modern’ like Thompson and Capstick’s nor expressively simplified like Skeaping’s. He was certainly not indifferent to contemporary trends in sculpture, and the private work he was producing by the 1940s includes nudes and other semi-abstract pieces derived from nature which show an obvious debt to Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth,38 but this interest in abstraction is hardly reflected in his work for the cathedral. Had it not been for his involvement with Liverpool Cathedral, Carter Preston would probably be remembered as an unusually talented designer of medals whose paintings and sculpture reflect progressive trends in twentieth-century British art. Through Scott’s great church, however, he was able to achieve something more. It could be said that the whole cathedral is a triumphant carrying forward into the twentieth century of nineteenth-century and earlier traditions, and that Carter Preston’s sculpture gains greatly in significance by its exceptional setting. Questions of fashion and modernity hardly seem relevant in considering such a building. It is interesting to compare the decoration of Liverpool Cathedral with J.F. Bentley’s slightly earlier Westminster Cathedral. Both buildings have their roots in the late gothic revival and the Arts and Crafts movement, but whereas Bentley’s interior combines in true Arts and Crafts manner the varied contributions of many artists and designers, Scott’s has a remarkably unified and consistent character. This is due of course to

39

the controlling hand of the architect, but also to the work of his favoured sculptor. That Scott himself recognised the importance of Carter Preston’s contribution, and that he valued him highly as a collaborating artist rather than a journeyman carver, is clear from a personal letter he wrote to him during the Second World War when building work was suspended. It is a worthy tribute from architect to sculptor: ‘I think the Dean, you and I are the happiest of men in our work, and I have to thank the Dean for discovering you and showing me some of your work. I wish I could get others to join us but religious art is not a flourishing plant in these materialistic times. I have seen an enormous improvement in sculpture since the early days of the cathedral. At first I had nothing but the sloppy clay technique school, impressionistic in character, a quality I hate in sculpture, so you can imagine when I found your clean cut work, full of that subtle abstract expression that I cannot define, I fell for it. I am more than grateful to you for rescuing the sculpture of this building from complete mediocrity or worse, and if the Dean can get some money I should like [to] get you to replace some of the worst things, the figures outside the Chapter House door and the relief panel in the reredos of the little chapel off the choir aisle. What fun we could have if we could knock the head off this Hitler and get back to work. I hope we shall have many more of our interesting talks at the cathedral, they are a joy to me, one of the few good things that have come out of this war.’ 39

40

1 Brief biographical details of Carter Preston are to be found in a short interview with the artist by George Whitfield, published in the Liverpool Review, Vol.2, 1927, pp.423-5, and in Roderick Bisson, The Sandon Studios Society and the Arts (1965) especially pp.29 and 170-2. 2 See Mary Bennett, The Art Sheds 1894-1905, catalogue of an exhibition at the Walker Art Gallery (Liverpool, 1981) and Jules Lubbock & Mark Crinson, Architecture: Art or Profession? (1994). 3 This register is now in the library of the Liverpool Art School, Hope Street. 4 Loc. cit. in note 1. 5 For the Sandon Studios Society see Bisson, Op. cit. in note 1. 6 The Bulletin of the Sandon Studios Society, No.1, March 1912, p.1. 7 Exhibition of Modern Art including works by the Post-Impressionists, Liberty Buildings, School Lane, Liverpool, 4 March - 1 April 1911. 8 In January 1913 Carter Preston also had a one man exhibition of watercolours at Carfax & Co, London, which consisted mostly of Merseyside and North Lancashire landscapes. 9 Manchester Guardian, 20 April 1912. 10 Liverpool Courier, 27 September 1912, and unidentified press cutting in the artist’s album. 11 National Art Library, Victoria & Albert Museum. 12 Not traced, but illustrated in the Liverpool Review, Loc. cit. in note 1. Carter Preston also designed a war memorial in the form of a bronze plaque for the Victoria Street building of the Liverpool Provision Trade (now occupied by the National Westminster Bank). 13 Liverpool Echo, 23 March 1918. 14 Ibid. 15 Information on these and other sculptors who worked on the cathedral is in Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s papers in the British Architectural Library, Royal Institute of British Architects, hereafter referred to as RIBA/ScGG. 16 See letter cited in note 39. 17 RIBA/ScGG, Evans to Scott, 30 March 1928; Scott to Evans, 30 March 1928. 18 Ibid., Carter Preston to Scott, 3 February and 9 April 1931. 19 Liverpool Record Office/Acc.1622, Scott to Carter Preston, 8 April 1931. Carter Preston estimated £75 to model and £80 to carve each figure. 20 Ibid., Scott to Carter Preston, 17 April 1931. 21 Ibid., Scott to Carter Preston, 15 May 1933. 22 Letters to Carter Preston from Scott and Radcliffe are in the Liverpool Record Office (LRO), Acc.1622. Letters to Scott from Radcliffe and Carter Preston are in Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s papers in the British Architectural Library, Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA). Letters from Carter Preston to Radcliffe are in the Radcliffe papers, Liverpool Record Office (LRO), Acc. 2342. (Apart from a few letters in the above locations, Dean Dwelly’s correspondence is untraced.) This correspondence is discussed and extensively quoted in Penelope Curtis, ‘The Sculptural Scheme in the Anglican Cathedral: Sculpting to Order ?’, Patronage & Practice, Sculpture on Merseyside, Penelope Curtis ed. (Liverpool, 1989) pp.94-101, which provides a very full account of Carter Preston’s work for the cathedral. A series of articles by Radcliffe in the Liverpool Cathedral Committee’s Quarterly Bulletin, nos.49-56, describes the subjects of the sculpture. 23 RIBA/ScGG, Scott to Radcliffe, 7 May 1937. 24 LRO/Acc.1622, Radcliffe to Carter Preston, 8 February 1933. 25 Ibid., Radcliffe to Carter Preston, 18 May 1933. 26 The Liverpool Review article cited in note 1 says that Carter Preston generally worked the clay with a modelling tool rather than his fingers, ‘in order that the planes may be retained as precisely as possible, and not be thumbed away by direct handling.’ 27 Ibid., Radcliffe to Carter Preston, 25 July 1933. 28 RIBA/ScGG, Carter Preston to Scott, 24 May 1934. 29 Ibid., Carter Preston to Scott, 30 May 1934. 30 Ibid., Radcliffe to Scott, 6 June 1934. 31 LRO/Acc.1622, Radcliffe to Carter Preston, 4 June 1934. 32 Quoted in Curtis, Op.cit. in note 22. 33 RIBA/ScGG, Carter Preston to Scott, 25 May 1935. 34. LRO/Acc.1622, Carter Preston to Radcliffe (undated draft). 35 Ibid., Radcliffe to Carter Preston, 25 August 1936. 36 Ibid., Carter Preston to Radcliffe, 29 August 1936 (draft). 37 Architect and Building News, 12 May 1933, pp.160-1, and Supplement. 38 For Carter Preston’s small scale domestic sculpture see Kenneth Romney Towndrow, ‘Small Sculpture in the Home’, The Studio, September 1947, pp.57-63. 39 LRO/Acc.1622, Scott to Carter Preston, 25 March 1942. Unlike the rest of his correspondence this letter is handwritten from Scott’s home rather than typewritten from his office.

41

NEXT-OF-KIN PLAQUE 1918

42

T H E A RT I S T A S M E DA L L I S T by Keith Sugden and Phyllis Stoddart

‘T

he qualities that have won for him so early an assured position amongst the first of English medallists are an extreme dexterity, a rare delicacy of finish, and, in design, a certain dignity and classic strength and beauty which recall the work of the Greeks, with, at times, a touch of the feeling that is to be found in the best work of the Italian 1 medallists’. Although the claims made in this quotation (referring to the Next-of-Kin plaque, 1918) might be dismissed as hyperbole, particularly with regard to a young artist at the start of his career as a medallist, Carter Preston could be described, with considerable justification, as a phenomenon. With time, the anonymous critic’s assessment would come to appear less exaggerated. There can be few British medallists of the twentieth century whose public work has covered such an eclectic range of commissions. Although a number of his contemporaries as medallists were able to enhance their numismatic reputations through the medium of coin design, few were able to bring to medal design the sheer diversity of artistic talents that enabled Carter Preston to accommodate so satisfactorily the technical constraints imposed by the medium. Coinage, which is mass-produced, has to withstand handling and stacking, thus making high relief impractical. The design of medals differs. One of the criticisms of Carter Preston’s attempts at coin design was that they were too medallic. His spirited response to this was that the ‘effect was obtained with planes not lines’2 which is, in fact, the basis of glyptic art, where tangible contrasts of light and shade are used to define detail and form in a monochromatic medium. Carter Preston’s modelling technique is a reflection of this understanding, and explains in large part his successful mastery of the medium of medal design. Initially, he would work out a design in a series of sketches and drawings until ready for carving. A special fine plaster was his preferred medium, as it was compact and less inclined to crumble, and the end result was a sharper image than could be produced by more conventional plasters. The modelling was effected with the use of a sharp tool, incising the design in intaglio; the firm texture of the plaster and method of carving ensured that the finished design had a clarity of form not blurred by overhandling. A raking light illuminated his workbench as he carved, throwing up a three dimensional positive image of his incuse design, and helping him to visualise the finished medal. In order to check on the progress and detail of his work, he used the softer medium of clay, pressing a piece of it into the negative mould (having first protected the surface of the mould with a thin layer of stearite) to obtain a positive image on the clay. The successfully

43

completed negative plaster mould would then be the master from which positive plaster casts could be taken for the creation of dies via the operation of the reducing machine. Quality of materials and accuracy of design were vital, as any blemishes are heightened and emphasised by the reducing machine on transferring the details of the plaster cast onto the die. As a general rule, medal designs were required to be submitted in the form of plaster casts, a drawing - however well worked-up - being considered ‘of no more use than a written description of an idea’.3 A cast is also more versatile, as it can be photographed and reduced to the actual medal size, as was done, for example, in the competition for the Flying medal (1918).4 The young Carter Preston’s outstanding success in the competition for the Next-of-Kin plaque, 1918, was the launching pad for his career as a medallist, and a number of commissions followed rapidly from it.5 The circumstances are worth relating, as they include a number of factors which were to recur frequently in the designs and working environment experienced by the subject of this essay: a predilection for classical references; the need to work within the constraints of prescriptive (sometimes overly so) commissions; and evidence of more experimental independent work outwith these constraints. In 1916, the Government had set up a committee to oversee the production of a memorial plaque for the families of those killed in action in the First World War. The committee required the subject matter to be a ‘symbolical figure... essentially simple and easily intelligible’.6 As a result of this prescription, in Carter Preston’s winning design, ‘the subject of sacrifice, death and loss, the essence of the memorial, is dealt with very indirectly,’7 and there was considerable subsequent criticism of the distancing effect brought about by the use of mythological (ie. classical) figures, which some believed trivialised the reality of war. Carter Preston’s alternative – rejected – designs for the medal, although still classical in concept, were actually more in sympathy with the critics, but it is certainly the case that the British approach stood in stark contrast to the contemporary German medal types, in which portrayals of war and its military paraphernalia were brutal and realistic in both context and execution. In 1922, the Deputy Master of the Royal Mint, Robert Johnson, set up the Royal Mint Advisory Committee, part of whose role it was to keep the Chancellor of the Exchequer (Master of the Mint) informed about Mint affairs, including the design and preparation of its medals. This new committee included G.F. (later Sir George) Hill, Keeper of the Department of Coins and Medals at the British Museum, who had also been involved in the earlier Government committee which dealt with the Next-of-Kin plaque. Hill was a classicist, and author of six fascicles in the monumental 29 volume Catalogue of Greek Coins in the British Museum. It is evident from the extant correspondence between the two men that Hill came to play an important advisory role in the development of Carter Preston’s medallic work, and many of the latter’s classical designs are directly influenced by the style and iconography of Greek coins of the classical period.8 A number of letters from Hill to Carter Preston contain direct references to particular pieces - such as those of Lysimachus and the city of Terina, suggested as models for the RAF medal (1918)9 - and, on a number of occasions, Hill sent casts of coins that he thought relevant to the commission in hand for the artist’s consideration. Hill was instrumental in moving Carter Preston away from the archaistic style of his earlier Jutland medal, 1916, towards a more classical style of design. The Jutland medal, conceived with Carter Preston’s brother-in-law, the artist and sculptor Herbert Tyson Smith, had not been received

44

above DISTINGUISHED FLYING CROSS 1918 below left KING’S MEDAL FOR SERVICE IN THE

CAUSE OF FREEDOM

1945

below right KOREA MEDAL 1953

45

above KING’S MEDAL FOR NATIVE CHIEFS c1920 below left GAS LIGHT AND COKE COMPANY MEDAL

46

below right Plaque for mirror commissioned by J.G. Gow

favourably by the Royal Mint, and it is evident that there was some antagonism within the Mint at the time towards the ‘archaic’ representation of subject matter. It is unclear why this is so – perhaps the use of classical language as the natural medium of monumental art, regarded by Curl10 as canonical in Britain by 1919, was being reflected in the miniature vehicle of medallic art – but, as late as 1927, Robert Johnson, remarking on Eric Gill’s work, regretted ‘the fact that his archaic style precluded the Mint ‘from utilising the skill and genius of so fine an artist.’’11 Fortunately for his future relationship with this most important of commissioning institutions, following a direct suggestion from Hill,12 Carter Preston abandoned the archaism of his earliest work, and began to draw more heavily on the vocabulary of classical allegory. Carter Preston’s association with the Royal Mint was to span five decades, and his output ranged from the design of seals and badges for British and Commonwealth use to the more familiar and public work of war medals and gallantry awards. In this latter context, he was once described by Robert Johnson as ‘considered by the [Royal Mint Advisory] Committee to be the only first-class artist in [war] medal work at present existing in this country.’13 Despite the numerous successful designs for the two world wars and the Korean campaign, his relationship with the Mint and their advisors was not without controversy and compromise in this field. The minutes of the Royal Mint Advisory Committee record the anxiety that a number of the members felt about using potentially offensive images – an early example of official political correctness. One of their criticisms of the Next-of–Kin plaque, for example, centred around the imagery of the conflict between the lion (Britain) and the eagle (Germany) in the exergue, which, although only small, was considered ‘unhelpful with regard to future, post-war relations.’14 An alternative design for the Korea medal, 1953, – a medal commissioned specifically from Carter Preston, the design not being open to competition – showed a lion subduing a dragon, a type that symbolised unequivocally the triumph of Britain over an oriental foe; the final design – presumably echoing the criticisms of thirty five years earlier – employed the less offensive classicism of Herakles and the Hydra. This same political sensitivity was also evident in Carter Preston’s successful design for the King’s Medal for Service in the Cause of Freedom, 1945, which got as far as the production of an electrotype at the Mint before being withdrawn on the grounds of its ambiguous iconography: known as the Good Samaritan medal, the Committee on the Grant of Honours and Medals criticised it on the grounds that ‘the Prime Minister thinks that the present design implies that the War was fought mainly to save the Jews from Hitler.’15 As a consequence, a less controversial design by T.H. Paget was chosen. Ironically, Carter Preston’s depiction paid homage to a well-known piece by the Renaissance master, Pisanello, long regarded as one of the chefs d’oeuvre of fifteenth century medallic art for the bravura of its foreshortened view of the Samaritan’s horse – a connection of which the Mint’s own Committee would have been aware, but presumably not the Committee on the Grant of Honours and Medals. Classical types and allusions provide the bulk of the iconography of Carter Preston’s work for the Mint and other commissioning bodies and manufacturers. However, he was also capable of producing strikingly original designs featuring animals and birds, as on the series of medals awarded to recipients of Certificates of Honour in a number of African colonies. His few attempts at combining classical and modern types were perhaps rather less successful. An early design for the King’s medal for Native Chiefs,16 c.1920, has a winged Nike riding a dolphin – a conflation of the

47

Greek coin types of Terina and Tarentum17 in the classical period – in front of a rigged battleship escorting a convoy. The two sit unhappily together, and the final version omits the former image. The medal presented to employees of the London Gas Light and Coke Company, who had protected the Company’s properties in their role as special constables in the First World War, shows Hermes in flight, with the decidedly unclassical image of a gasometer in the background. Despite an anonymous reviewer’s optimistic statement that ‘Mr Carter Preston can make an ornament out of a gasometer, as in (this) romantic medal,’18 the overall effect of the medal, whilst interesting, is somewhat incongruous and certainly far from romantic. Although he attracted a number of non-commemorative commissions over the years, including seals for clerics (the Bishops of Hereford and Southwark), a school (Giggleswick), and a notable plaque for a mirror commissioned by a local member of the medical profession (J.G. Gow) (p13), the overwhelming bulk of Carter Preston’s medallic work outside the Royal Mint was institutional and commemorative (military or otherwise) in character. The two principal independent manufacturers who employed his services were John Pinches19 and J.R. Gaunt.20 Carter Preston’s work for the latter included designs for unofficial Coronation medallions, the richly symbolic Masonic Peace medal, 1919, and the First World War Peace Treaty medal, 1919. Interestingly, the reverse of this last medal was used by Gaunt as the standard obverse on an extensive series of medallions struck for towns throughout the United Kingdom to celebrate the same event (the reverse in each case naming the individual town and mayor), and, being produced in very large numbers, has consequently become one of the most familiar designs on local commemorative medallions. The designs for Pinches included three fine classical prize medals. The Gold medal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 1920, depicts Hygieia feeding a snake from a bowl in her left hand, and crowning a kneeling male figure of Research with her right; Research holds the lamp of knowledge. The overall composition of the piece (the reverse shows Chiron supporting the young Asklepios) received the enthusiastic imprimatur of G.F. Hill.21 The Serena Italian medal of the British Academy was produced in 1920 to commemorate the alliance with Italy in the First World War, and is awarded for services to Italian culture. The design of the reverse, in which Britannia faces Italia, is an imaginative reworking of Exekias’ Achilles and Ajax at play.22 Finally, the Edward Jones Prize medal of the Institute of Bankers, 1920, awarded for proficiency in Spanish, depicts Hermes with his familiar winged petasos and caduceus riding a bull. The bull is a common type on Greek coins of South Italy and Sicily,23 but here the artist has combined its classical origins with its use as a neat rebus: the bull as a symbol for Spain; and the bull as symbol for a confident stock market. Carter Preston’s origins, training and professional career were all in Liverpool, and his success on a national scale should not obscure the major contribution made to the medallic art of his own city. Two medals encapsulate this contribution in a particularly satisfactory way. In view of his long association with the Sandon Studios Society, which made its home in the old Blue Coat School, it is entirely fitting that he should design the personal medal presented to F.D. Hamel Calder by the Sandon Society in 1927 for her efforts in saving the School for use as an Arts Centre. The reverse is one of the few architectural perspectives produced by Carter Preston; typically, the exergue includes classical figures – a female extending her wings in a protective gesture around an artist, who holds a sculpture of Athena (patroness of the Arts) in one hand and a sculptor’s hammer in 48

above FIRST WORLD WAR PEACE TREATY MEDAL 1919 below left GOLD MEDAL • Royal Society of Medicine 1920

below right reverse of SERENA ITALIAN MEDAL 1920

49

above obverse of EDWARD JONES PRIZE MEDAL • Institute of Bankers 1920 below reverse of EDWARD JONES PRIZE MEDAL • Institute of Bankers 1920

50

the other. The second medal is his commemorative plaque for the inauguration of Liverpool Cathedral, 1930. Nothing in his work is further removed from the quiet dignity of classical iconography. However, it is far from being only ‘a purely modernistic representation.’24 Its design combines both medieval and modern elements, reflecting the neo-Gothic character of the building it celebrates. The artist has succinctly incorporated architectural details of the new cathedral into the Virgin’s throne on the obverse, recalling the solid fifteenth century throne of Masaccio’s Madonna and Child. The elongated, stylized figures are essentially two-dimensional, like icons, their substance conveyed by surface patterning and shallow outline boundaries, recalling the figures carved around the cathedral font, also by Carter Preston. The plaque can be interpreted as an integral part of the new cathedral, transcending its medallic isolation. At the start of Carter Preston’s career several independent manufacturers were active in the fields of war (and associated) medals and commemorative medallions. However, the appointment of Robert Johnson as Deputy Master in 1922 ushered in a new era for medallic art at the Royal Mint. Johnson (whose mother was herself an artist) was keen to revive the reputation of the Mint’s Medal Department by encouraging talented young sculptors and artists to design for it - a philosophy which, when implemented, would inevitably work to the detriment of the smaller manufacturers. There is evidence that the Royal Mint pursued an aggressive policy against them - Johnson was also highly critical of the quality of their work (although a partly commercial motive should not, perhaps, be entirely ruled out) – and their role was to diminish rapidly in comparison with that of the Mint. Good relations with the Royal Mint were therefore of vital importance for a successful career as a medallist. However, notwithstanding the vigour and originality of Carter Preston’s work with war medals and gallantry awards, which assured the longevity of his relationship with the Mint in this field, we should perhaps not be surprised that the quantity of his other output for the Royal Mint should follow the fortunes of powerful sponsors and supporters within the establishment. When Johnson died in 1938, the Royal Mint appointed Sir John Craig as his successor; the latter’s interests lay less with medallic work than with coins, a pattern which continued under the Deputy Masters that followed. As a consequence, the number of Carter Preston’s commissions for commemorative medals declined, and this reduction in work for the Mint was compounded by his inability to break into the relatively more active field of coin design. In an interview published in the Liverpool Daily Post of 15th January 1948, towards the end of his career as a medallist, Carter Preston expressed his view that ‘the standard of designing for medals has risen considerably since the 1914-1918 war’. It is difficult not to be in complete agreement with this statement, made in all personal modesty. However, it is equally difficult not to appreciate that Edward Carter Preston’s own oeuvre stands as eloquent testimony to the major contribution made by him towards this modern Renaissance in medallic art.

51

above Plaque for Inauguration of Liverpool Cathedral 1930 below MEDAL FOR F.D. HAMEL CALDER 1927

52

1 Liverpool Record Office (LRO)/Acc.1622; ‘Mr Preston’s (sic) Art: an appreciation’. No author, and undated (but 1918). 2 LRO/Acc.1622 730 PRE 4/17/1. 3 Public Record Office (PRO) MINT 20/1917. 4 LRO/Acc.1622 730 PRE 4/1/16. 5 It is arguable that he won both first and second prizes: his award-winning entry, submitted under the pseudonym ‘Pyramus’, was for two model designs. 6 P. Dutton, ‘The Dead Man’s Penny: a short history of the next of kin memorial plaque’, The Medal, no.29 (1990), pp.6271, at p.63. 7 Ibid, p.67. 8 The term ‘classical’ is often used to describe the period of Greek history between 479 BC to the time of Alexander, during which many of the great achievements of Greek civilisation were recorded. 9 LRO/Acc.1622 730 PRE 4/25/14. The coinage of Lysimachus (King of Thrace 297-281 BC) depicted a seated Athena holding Nike on the reverse; from the mid fifth to the early fourth century BC that of Terina (a city in Bruttium in South Italy) featured a seated Nike holding a wreath. 10 J.S. Curl, A Celebration of Death (London, 1993). 11 C. Eimer, ‘British Medals and their makers 1900-1950: pt.2’, The Medal, no.16 (1990), pp.58-68, at p.60. 12 LRO/Acc.1622 730 PRE 4/25/14. 13 PRO MINT 20/774. 14 Dutton, Op. cit., p.66. 15 PRO MINT 20/1914. 16 A.M. Jamieson, Medals awarded to North American Indian chiefs 1714-1922 and to loyal African and other chiefs in various territories within the British Empire (London, 1936), pp.77-82; PRO MINT 20/651 and 2419. 17 The reverse of the coinage of Tarentum in Calabria from the mid-fifth to the mid-third centuries BC showed a dolphin rider, usually identified as Taras, the mythical founder of the city, who was saved from drowning by Poseidon sending a dolphin to carry him safely to the shore; he founded the city where he landed. 18 LRO/Acc.1622 PRE 4/4/3-4 and 4/6/1. 19 Messrs John Pinches, medallists and die sinkers, London, c. 1850s-1969. 20 J.R. Gaunt & Son, die sinkers and button manufacturers, Birmingham and London, c. 1886-1973. 21 LRO/Acc.1622 – two unaccessioned letters from Hill (21/8/1920 and 28/8/1920). 22 J. Boardman, Athenian Black Figure Vases (London, 1974), fig.100. 23 For example, on the coinages of Thurium in Lucania, Hyria and Neapolis in Campania, and Syracuse in Sicily. 24 C. Eimer, ‘British Medals and their Makers 1900-1950: pt.1’, The Medal, no.15 (1989), pp.10-23, at pp.20-1.

53

MERMAN

54

P R I VAT E P L E A S U R E S by Cecilia Crighton

A

t the same time that he was working on the sixty austerely beautiful figures for Liverpool Cathedral, Edward Carter Preston maintained a steady output of his own work. He was an extremely skilled carver for which he had a reputation for excellence.1 George Whitfield, the Echo art critic, stated firmly: ‘With this artist, perfection of technique naturally goes without question.’2 Carter Preston was also respected for his wide-ranging skills in watercolour, lettering, church plate, stained glass, engraving and medals: ‘Always incredibly industrious, he had the mastery of many techniques at his fingertips.’3 This approach to the visual arts mirrored a man with multi-faceted, wide-ranging interests. Fellow Sandon Studio Society member, Roderick Bisson, later recalled Carter Preston’s ‘enthusiasms for such matters as the Golden Section, the Lost Continent of Atlantis, Oriental Mysticism, Social Credit and the Theories of Vernon Blake, which, from time to time, led to long monologues.’4 Another writer noted sympathetically that Carter Preston stood at odds ‘in an age that finds Renaissance man particularly difficult to understand.’5 If his interests were unusually broad for the time, they were also invaluable to his practice as a sculptor. Carter Preston had an open-minded, expansive approach to his work permitting constant invention and a freshly imaginative vision of his art. One of Carter Preston’s strongest and most enduring interests was Oriental art but it is also possible to see African, Babylonian, Egyptian and American Indian references as well. In addition, he was also engaged with European modernism and admired Braque, Cezanne, Henri GaudierBrzeska, Epstein, Moore and Hepworth. A trip to Paris as a young man caused some difficulties because he ‘was at that time a vegetarian and a teetotaller abjuring even tea and coffee.’6 It is intriguing to speculate not only what he managed to find to eat in Paris, but also what he saw. There may be some clues in an undated sketchbook containing pencil drawings of the Cathedral figures. Here there is a study of trees in a rather Mondrian-like style and a tiny pink and lilac gouache of a standing figure in the centre, a seated figure with raised knee to the left and a recumbent figure to the right reminiscent of Cezanne’s bathers. If his studio sculpture reveals a wide variety of philosophical and visual influences it is equally clear that his work never loses its individual vision. Whereas the sculptures for the Cathedral Central Space were modelled in clay, first as small scale maquettes and then full size, the works which Carter Preston made for himself are predominantly carved, which implies and requires a fundamentally different approach, both to the

55

structure of the piece and to the qualities inherent in the material itself. He produced these works entirely for the pleasure of creating them. They were not commissions and, though some were sold, many remain within the family to date. Part of the satisfaction in making these smaller works was the contrast in technique to making large scale public commissions or the very detailed intaglio work involved in designing medals: ‘[Carter Preston], like William Morris, can work upon many things at the same time, and small sculpture, especially in wood, is often the result of relief from heavier tasks: an hour’s relaxation in carving with plain knife and a rough block of wood in the art’s simplest and most ancient manner.’7 Often choosing to work with whatever came to hand, including off-cuts from larger works such as the Nelson figurehead, Carter Preston would enjoy revealing, as he carved, the forms he had seen in the original uncut material. Wood lends itself to smooth, rounded forms, and Carter Preston was adept in exploiting the grain and colour to add textural richness and detail to his carvings. This is seen in the beautiful and slender Standing Woman in ash and the cone-breasted primitive Figure in Yew, where the grain of the wood caresses the curves of the form like contour lines, accented further by the slight twist of the figure. The latter sculpture has some of the same stylistic tendencies as Barbara Hepworth’s Figure in Sycamore of 1931. The outline of the uncut timber often suggested a particular treatment to Carter Preston. The Merman was cut from a tall round piece of sycamore (afterwards stained) that lent itself to the arrangement of a man and fish diving together in close but lively unison. Again, the extraordinary Totem Pole was carved out of a tall thin length of black walnut: at the top is a kneeling naked figure in an Egyptian head-dress, below which are a lioness, a bird with a snake in its mouth, a fish, and a beetle on the base, with the grain running down the bodies and wings. This is perhaps one of the clearest visual reflections of Carter Preston’s eclectic interests. In 1933 Sir Giles Gilbert Scott invited Carter Preston to carve Four Winds for the tower of Cambridge University Library. This followed soon after a separate sequence of Four Winds (actually eight as each wind appears twice) which the architect, Charles Holden, commissioned in 1928 for the new London Underground Headquarters building in Broadway, Westminster. Three of these eight winds were carved by Eric Gill, who led the project, the remaining five by A. H. Gerard, A.Wyon, Eric Aumonier, F. Rabinovitch and Henry Moore. The closesness in date of the two projects invites a comparison. However, the fact that the London figures are reliefs whilst Carter Preston’s are carved in the round limits the similarities because of the inherent differences in technique. This difference shows itself in the greater sense of movement that can be conveyed in the reliefs than is possible in the figure in the round. In other respects the comparison reveals greater similarities than differences, though Henry Moore’s West Wind must be excepted for its singular approach. The two schemes share a broadly classical approach both to the treatment of the figure and composition whilst the handling of detail and ornament is contemporary. The rayed lines and zigzag motifs typical of Art Deco are evident in both series. This is interesting not because of any implication that Carter Preston was not original in his interpretation but because it confirms his dialogue with contemporary issues in style. The combination of classical style and contemporary detail evident in the Four Winds also appears in many of Carter Preston’s studio sculptures of the same period. Leda, alabaster, shows Leda lying back on the body of the swan, its head next to hers in a gesture both sensuous and

56

left STANDING WOMAN right TOTEM POLE

57

left EAST WIND • Cambridge University Library 1933 right WEST WIND • Cambridge University Library 1933

58

left NORTH WIND • Cambridge University Library 1933 right SOUTH WIND • Cambridge University Library 1933

59

above ARMS AND THE MAN (press cutting from scrapbook) below The artist carving the NELSON figurehead for S.S. Conway 1938 (Arms and the Man in background)

60

elegant. The swooping curves of the drapery around and below her arched and smoothly finished body provide one kind of rhythm, the more geometric and patterned treatment of the swan’s wings and Leda’s hair and head-dress quite another. Europa, black basalt, also offers both harmony of form and contrasts of rhythm and texture. Europa and the bull lie together in total unison whilst beneath them curving, stylised waves contrast with the incised and unpolished base. Man, Woman and Child expresses the unity of the family in a group of large-limbed, closely entwined figures. The subject and bold treatment of form suggests echoes of sculptures by Henry Moore, but the sense of mass combined with the manner of carving (particularly the strongly incised and stylised hair) is entirely expressive of Carter Preston’s personal vision. All of these works are on a relatively small scale: Leda 55 centimetres long, Europa 45 centimetres long and Man, Woman and Child 21.8 centimetres high, yet all convey a strong sense of monumentality. This quality runs through all Carter Preston’s work, he had an ability to invest an expansiveness of conception even when working on the small scale of medal design. By the same token it is a significant part of his achievement in the Cathedral sculptures, many of which are not large in architectural terms, that they nevertheless convey a strength and presence far beyond their actual size. Celebrations of the human figure, animals, family and love are favourite themes in Carter Preston’s studio sculptures, though his treatment of a subject is often unexpected. A characteristic example of this is the Dancing Couple where the flowing dress of the female figure creating an unusual contrast with the naked body of her male partner. Likewise Man, Woman and Child, already mentioned, treats the family as a complete unit instead of the more typical focus on mother and baby. In the late 1930s Carter Preston exhibited a sculpture which takes the stylisation of the human figure in his work to a new extreme and which expressed a uniquely mechanistic theme. The floorstanding Arms and the Man can be seen in the background of a photograph showing Carter Preston carving the huge wooden Nelson figurehead. It is likely this is the model rather than the final brutalist metal sculpture which he exhibited at the Bluecoat. A dramatically lit photograph of Arms and the Man appeared in the Echo with a lengthy review by George Whitfield. ‘You must see this. Photographs give no idea of the menace of the thing.’8 Whitfield saw very well how Carter Preston had absorbed and expressed the mood of the time, considering the piece: ‘a sultry satire upon modern international and political urges...two unprotected human bodies (a woman and a man) being pressed downwards upon their knees by the metal arms of a monster bereft of brain but active with evil life.’9 It is indeed full of menace, recalling the consuming inhumanity of machines evoked in Fritz Lang’s film, Metropolis. In Whitfield’s review, he refers to the modern machine ‘of thought and policy’ which is ‘crushing the humanities to the following of a mechanical idea, or “ideal” as the dictators call it.’10 Although politics played little part in Carter Preston’s art he was deeply concerned at the rise of fascism in Europe and the imminence of war in the late 1930s. In addition to the threat of invasion, the reduction in freedom of thought imposed by fascism clashed with Carter Preston’s views and invoked the vivid response of Arms and the Man. During the Second World War Carter Preston continued to work on his Cathedral commissions as long as time and circumstance would allow. When the bombing of Liverpool was at its worst he and his family escaped to their cottage on the Lancashire/Yorkshire border. Here he continued to make wood carvings and watercolours. Painting had long been a favourite holiday

61

MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD

62

63

EUROPA

left SEATED FIGURE right ABSTRACT

64

pursuit, not to mention a useful source of funds because his pictures were always sought after. His early watercolours up to1930 are traditionally topographical, reflecting his admiration for the English watercolour school, but as the years progressed his treatment of form became increasingly sculptural. During the war this developed into a personal language of biomorphic abstraction creating a closer dialogue between his watercolours and carving. An early example of this new abstract approach to sculpture, Composition, was illustrated by Kenneth Romney Towndrow in a Studio article of 1947. More complex and detailed, less broad than much of the work of Moore and Hepworth, Composition scrolls and swirls in space. The article describes it as ‘ a study-carving in hard plaster. Carter Preston has expressed his knowledge and appreciation of limestone boulder formations while retaining beneath a more complex surface rhythm.’11 In the post-war period Carter Preston continued to develop this approach often using tree or rock forms as a starting point, though some works, such as Abstract, clearly have a figurative origin. Written soon after the war, Romney Towndrow’s article in the Studio seeks to distance art from the destructiveness of the previous decade by emphasising the validity of artists who ‘in the revival of the carving and polishing of fine stones and woods, have borne in mind the ancient love of hand sculpture and its influence, throughout history, upon taste in all departments of social and domestic life.’ 12 As well as Carter Preston, Towndrow mentions Marjorie Drawbell, Gwynneth Holt, John Luxmoore, Richard Bedford and Meg Woolf. Carter Preston is placed in the vanguard of this group for his ‘mastery of so many mediums [sic]. He is rarely to be visited without the discovery of metals, wood, glass, stone or plaster revealing an answer to some question put with a vigour and freshness of imagination that in itself has the rare urgency of genius.’ If Towndrow in his article placed too narrow an emphasis on craftsmanship for the realities of the post-war period, Carter Preston himself recognised the changes that the war had brought, as his move into abstraction clearly demonstrates. Once again his open minded intellectualism enabled him to re-invent his art in a new idiom. However, in retrospect, his achievements as a sculptor will be most widely remembered in terms of his inventive, often inspired, relationship with his subject, his unusual and gifted adaptability to his working context and his unerring judgement with regard to ‘truth to materials’, all of this placing him firmly as a significant figure in his generation of artists and sculptors.

65

1

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

66

The main series of figures in the central space of the Cathedral were modelled in clay and cast in plaster by Carter Preston and then carved in situ by a friend and fellow sculptor, Reginald Yorke. This arrangement, worked out with the architect Sir Giles Gilbert Scott, allowed Carter Preston more time to originate the figures and saved costs for the Cathedral. Liverpool Echo, ‘What’s Wrong With the World? Liverpool Artist’s Metal ‘Monster’, By the Echo Art Critic’, press clipping from family scrapbook, tentatively dated in pen 1938. Roderick Bisson, The Sandon Studio Society and the Arts (Liverpool 1965) p29. Bisson Op. cit., p29. Kenneth Romney Towndrow, ‘Small Sculpture in the Home’, The Studio, vol 134, No 654, September 1947, p62. Bisson Op. cit., p29. See article cited in note 5, p62. See article cited in note 2. Ibid. Ibid. See article cited in note 5, p58. See article cited in note 5, p62.

67

LEDA

above Edward Carter Preston carving the NELSON figurehead c1938 below NELSON figurehead 1938

68

LIST

OF

EXHIBITS

All dimensions given in centimetres: height x width x depth

EDWARD AND MARIE CARTER PRESTON

MARIE CARTER PRESTON

oil on canvas, 90 x 58.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

oil on canvas, 72.5 x 61 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

LOW GILL

ST CHRISTOPHER

watercolour, 34 x 48 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

oil on panel (dummy board), 152.4 x 76.5 cms John Vaughan

TATHAM FELL

TEMPERANCE

watercolour, 33 x 44.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster maquette, 120 x 28 x 28 cms The Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral

GLARAMARA

THE ANGEL OF DEATH

watercolour, 32 x 40 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster maquette, 136 x 30 x 43 cms The Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral

CAUSEY PIKE, CUMBERLAND

THE SOWER

watercolour, 30 x 39 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster maquette, 170 x 40 x 30 cms The Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral

WOMEN AND CHILDREN IN LANDSCAPE

HOPE

bodycolour on silk, 35 x 23 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster maquette, 107 x 30 x 26 cms The Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral

JUDGEMENT OF PARIS

FORTITUDE

spirit fresco, 42 x 52.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster maquette, 120 x 35 x 25 cms The Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral

TWO STANDING FEMALE NUDES

JEREMIAH

spirit fresco, 40 x 27 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster maquette, 170 x 43 x 30 cms The Dean and Chapter of Liverpool Cathedral

STILL LIFE WITH LILAC AND LABURNUM

ST.LUKE

oil on canvas, 43 x 28 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

coloured plaster, 65 x 22 x 22 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

MIRROR

ST JOHN THE BAPTIST

carved wood, copper medallion with enamel, 138 x 76.2 cms James Gow

coloured plaster, 65 x 28 x 28 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston 69

70

PIETA

STANDING FEMALE FIGURE

hopton wood and black basalt relief, 28.3 x 30.2 x 3 Private collection

fruit wood, 49.2 x 12 x 9.2 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

ST.GEORGE’S HOTEL

RECLINING FIGURE

plaster relief, 38 x 26.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

walnut, 23.3 x 44 x 17 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

EAST WIND

DEVIL GROUP

coloured plaster, 46 x 12 x 12 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

bronze, 15.5 x 18 x 11 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

NORTH WIND

ABSTRACT

coloured plaster, 46 x 12 x 12 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

teak, 35. 7 x 11.5 x 10 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

SOUTH WIND

STANDING WOMAN

coloured plaster, 46 x 12 x 12 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

ash, 66.8 x 11 x 11 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

WEST WIND

MERMAN

coloured plaster, 46 x 12 x 12 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

wood, 55 x 13 x 15 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

MOTHER AND CHILD

RECLINING WOMAN

plaster, 35.5 x 18.5 x 20.9 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

wood, 24.6 x 36.5 x 20 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

EUROPA

HEAD

black basalt, 45 x 55 x 23 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

portland stone, 40 x 7 x 20 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

LEDA

HEAD OF NELSON C.1938

alabaster, 23.9 x 55.9 x 22.9 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

coloured plaster, 38.2 x 24 x 34 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

MOTHER AND CHILD GROUP

NELSON FIGUREHEAD 1938

portland stone, 67.3 x 62.2 x 38 cms private collection courtesy of Ryan Wood Antiques

painted plaster, 49 x 18 x 22 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

MUSIC

WOMAN AND CHILD

wooden panel, 61 x 67.3 x 2.5 cms private collection courtesy of Ryan Wood Antiques

hopton wood stone, 56 x 14.5 x 19.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

HERCULES

ABSTRACT

white marble, 16.2 x 36.5 x 16 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

wood, 35.5 x 18 x 16.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD

ABSTRACT

hopton wood stone, 24.5 x 17.9 x 21.8 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

mahogany, 47 x 28.5 x 13 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

ABSTRACT

LOPPED TREE

hopton wood stone, 34.5 x 35 x 7.4 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

watercolour, 50 x 31 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

ASSYRIAN FIGURE C.1915

FELLED TREE FORM

plychrome box, 23 x 4.2 x 7.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

watercolour, 35.5 x 50 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

DRAGON C.1915

NEXT-OF-KIN MEMORIAL PLAQUE

plychrome figure, 14 x 5 x 20 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

bronze, 120 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

DRAGON C.1915

NEXT-OF-KIN MEMORIAL PLAQUE

plychrome figure, 12.2 x 18 x 7 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster, 125 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

JOFFRE & THE GALLIC COCK C.1915

NEXT-OF-KIN MEMORIAL PLAQUE

plychrome figure, 25 x 13 x 14 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster, 122 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

GEORGE AND THE DRAGON C.1915

NEXT-OF-KIN MEMORIAL PLAQUE

plychrome figure, 33.5 x 33.5 x22 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

watercolour on paper, 120 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

STILL LIFE WITH COFFEE POT

MODEL FOR THE AIR FORCE CROSS

watercolour, 51 x 32 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster, 183 x 162 mm The Manchester Museum

STILL LIFE WITH SCULPTURE

MODEL FOR THE WAR MEDAL 1939-45

oil on canvas, 49 x 31 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster, 153 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

STILL LIFE WITH EGGS AND JUG

MODEL FOR THE KOREA MEDAL

watercolour, 51 x 29 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster, 157 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

RIVERBED ABSTRACT, BENTHAM

PLAQUE TO COMMEMORATE THE OPENING OF LIVERPOOL CATHEDRAL

watercolour, 25 x 53.5 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

plaster, 255 x 136 mm The Manchester Museum

RIVERBED ABSTRACT, BENTHAM watercolour, 28 x 54 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

PLAQUE TO COMMEMORATE THE OPENING OF LIVERPOOL CATHEDRAL

TREEFORMS

plaster, 254 x 134 mm The Manchester Museum

watercolour, 32 x 53 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

BLUE COAT SCHOOL MEDAL

TREES WITH BLOSSOM

plaster, 150 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

watercolour, 31 x 50 cms Estate of Edward Carter Preston

71

BLUE COAT SCHOOL MEDAL plaster, 155 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

DESIGNS FOR THE GREAT SEAL FOR NORTHERN IRELAND OF 1923 plaster, 132 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

PRESIDENT OF THE GUILD OF UNDERGRADUATES plaster, 238 x 114 mm The Manchester Museum

MODEL FOR AN OBVERSE COIN DESIGN plaster, 164 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

LIVERPOOL SCHOOL OF TROPICAL MEDICINE/ WARRINGTON YORKE MEDAL

MODEL FOR COINAGE OF KING FAISAL OF IRAQ 1927

plaster, 153 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

plaster, 132 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

LIVERPOOL SCHOOL OF TROPICAL MEDICINE/ WARRINGTON YORKE MEDAL

SERENA MEDAL

plaster, 155 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

initial sketches for both obverse and reverse pencil, ink, pastel, 45 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

AL SERVICES MEDAL

SERENA MEDAL

plaster, 184 x 149 mm The Manchester Museum

mould for the reverse of the medal plaster, 215 mm outer diameter The Manchester Museum

MODEL FOR THE SEAL OF THE COUNTY PALATINE OF LANCASTER plaster, 208 mm diameter Manchester Museum

SERENA MEDAL model of the reverse plaster, 177 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

MODEL FOR THE SEAL OF THE DUCHY OF LANCASTER plaster, 250 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

SERENA MEDAL

MODEL FOR UGANDA MEDAL

trial impressions from the dies lead, each 48 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

plaster, 220 x 163 mm The Manchester Museum

SERENA MEDAL OF THE BRITISH ACADEMY The Manchester Museum

MODEL FOR SIERRE LEONE MEDAL plaster, 225 x 164 mm The Manchester Museum

MODEL FOR SIERRE LEONE MEDAL but later changed to SOMALILAND PROTECTORATE plaster, 240 x 177 mm The Manchester Museum

MODEL FOR THE OFFICIAL SEAL OF TANGANYIKA 1958 plaster, 172 mm diameter The Manchester Museum

DESIGNS FOR THE GREAT SEAL FOR NORTHERN IRELAND OF 1923 plaster, 132 mm diameter The Manchester Museum 72