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Specimens of typefaces by Eric Gill
Specimens of typefaces by Eric Gill

Arthur Eric Rowton Gill (22 February 1882 – 17 November 1940) was a British sculptor, typeface designer, stonecutter and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement. Events 1495 - King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne Year 1882 ( MDCCCLXXXII) was a Common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common Events 284 - Diocletian is proclaimed emperor by his soldiers Year 1940 ( MCMXL) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full 1940 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland Typography is the art and techniques of arranging type, Type design, and modifying type Glyphs Type glyphs are created and modified using a variety Printmaking is the Process of making artworks by Printing, normally on Paper. The Arts and Crafts Movement was a British, Canadian, and American Aesthetic movement occurring in the last years of the 19th century and the Today he is a controversial figure, with his well known religious views and subject matter being seen at odds with his paraphiliaic behaviour and erotic art.

Contents

Life

Gill was born in 1882 in Brighton, Sussex (now East Sussex) and in 1897 the family moved to Chichester. Brighton ( is a town on the south coast of England and with its neighbour Hove, forms the city of Brighton and Hove. East Sussex is a county in South East England. It is bordered by the counties of Kent, Surrey and West Sussex, and to the Chichester is a cathedral city in West Sussex, England. It has a long history as a settlement its Roman past and its subsequent importance Eric studied at Chichester Technical and Art School, and in 1900 moved to London to train as an architect with the practice of W.D. Caroe, specialists in ecclesiastical architecture. London ( ˈlʌndən is the capital and largest urban area in the United Kingdom. An architect is a licensed individual who leads a design team in the Planning and Design of buildings and participates in oversight of Building Construction William Douglas Caroe (1857–1938 was a British Architect, particularly of churches Frustrated with his training, he took evening classes in stone masonry at Westminster Technical Institute and in calligraphy at the Central School of Arts and Crafts, where Edward Johnston, creator of the London Underground typeface, became a strong influence. Calligraphy (from Greek kallos "beauty" + graphẽ "writing" is the art of writing (Mediavilla 1996 17 Edward Johnston CBE ( 11 February 1872 &ndash 26 November 1944) was a British Craftsman who is credited with The London Underground is a Metro system serving a large part of Greater London and neighbouring areas of Essex, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire In Typography, a typeface is a set of one or more Fonts designed with stylistic unity each comprising a coordinated set of Glyphs A typeface usually comprises In 1903 he gave up his architectural training to become a calligrapher, letter-cutter and monumental mason.

In 1904 he married Ethel Hester Moore (1878–1961), and in 1907 he moved with his family to "Sopers", a house in the village of Ditchling in Sussex, which would later become the centre of an artists' community inspired by Gill. Ditchling is a village and Civil parish in the Lewes District of East Sussex, England. There he started producing sculpture – his first public success was Mother and Child (1912).

In 1913 he moved to Hopkin's Crank at Ditchling Common, 2 miles north of the village. In 1914 he produced sculptures for the stations of the cross in Westminster Cathedral. Stations of the Cross (or Way of the Cross; in Latin, Via Crucis; also called the Via Dolorosa or Way of Sorrows, or simply Westminster Cathedral in London, England, is the Mother church of the Roman Catholic community in England and Wales and the Metropolitan In the same year he met the typographer Stanley Morison. Stanley Morison ( 6 May 1889 &ndash 11 October 1967) was an English Typographer, designer and historian of printing After the war, together with Hilary Pepler and Desmond Chute, Gill founded The Guild of St Joseph and St Dominic at Ditchling, where his pupils included the young David Jones, who soon began a relationship with Gill's daughter, Petra. Harry Douglas Clark Pepler (1878–1951 known as Hilary Pepler, was an English printer writer and poet Father Desmond Macready Chute (1895-1962 was an English artist who became a Catholic priest in 1927 The Guild of St Joseph and St Dominic was an Art colony and experiment in communal life in early 20th century England David Jones CH ( 1 November 1895 – 28 October 1974) was both an artist and one of the most important first generation British

cari naked reclining on a leopard skin, a graphite drawing by Gill (1928).
cari naked reclining on a leopard skin, a graphite drawing by Gill (1928). The Mineral graphite, as with Diamond and Fullerene, is one of the Allotropes of carbon.

In 1924 he moved to Capel-y-ffin in Wales, where he set up a new workshop, to be followed by Jones and other disciples. Capel-y-ffin is a hamlet in Powys, south Wales, some 14 miles from Abergavenny and 8 miles from Hay-on-Wye on the English-Welsh border in the In 1925 he designed the Perpetua typeface, with the uppercase based upon monumental Roman inscriptions, for Morison, who was working for the Monotype Corporation. Perpetua is a Typeface that was designed by British sculptor typeface designer stonecutter and printmaker Eric Gill (1882–1940 Monotype Imaging Inc is a Typesetting and Typeface design company ( Type foundry) responsible for many developments in Printing technology This was followed by the Gill Sans typeface in 1927–30, based on the sans-serif lettering originally designed by Johnston for London Underground. Gill Sans is a humanist Sans-serif Typeface designed by Eric Gill in 1927 and released 1928 The London Underground is a Metro system serving a large part of Greater London and neighbouring areas of Essex, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire In the period 1930-31 Gill designed the typeface Joanna which he used to handset his book, An Essay on Typography. Joanna is an old style Serif Typeface designed by Eric Gill (1882–1940 in the period 1930–31 and named for one of his daughters

Gill soon tired of Capel-y-ffin, coming to feel that it had the wrong atmosphere, and also being too far from London, where most of his clients were. In 1928 he moved to Pigotts near High Wycombe in Buckinghamshire, where he set up a printing press and lettering workshop. See also High Wycombe Western Australia High Wycombe (hai ˈwɪk Buckinghamshire (abbreviated Bucks) is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan home county in South East England. He took on a number of apprentices, including David Kindersley, who in turn became a successful sculptor and engraver, and John Skelton (1923–1999), his nephew, and also noted as an important letterer and sculptor. David Guy Barnabas Kindersley ( 11 June 1915 -1995 was a British stone letter-carver and Typeface designer and the founder of the Kindersley Other apprentices included Laurie Cribb, Donald Potter and Walter Ritchie. [1] Others in the household included Denis Tegetmeier, married to Gill's daughter Petra, and Rene Hague, married to the other daughter, Joanna.

In 1932 Gill produced a group of sculptures, Prospero and Ariel, for the BBC's Broadcasting House in London. Broadcasting House is the headquarters and Registered office of the BBC in Portland Place, London, England. In 1937, he designed a postage stamp for the Post Office, and in 1938 produced The Creation of Adam, three bas-reliefs in stone for the League of Nations building in Geneva. During this period he was made a Royal Designer for Industry, the highest British award for designers, by the Royal Society of Arts and became a founder-member of the newly established Faculty of Royal Designers for Industry. Royal Designer for Industry is a distinction established by the British Royal Society of Arts (or RSA in 1936, to encourage a high standard of industrial design and The Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts Manufactures and Commerce ( RSA) is a British multi-disciplinary institution based in London.

A deeply religious man, Eric Gill published numerous essays on the relationship between art and religion. He also produced a number of erotic engravings. [2] Gill died of lung cancer in Harefield Hospital, Uxbridge, Middlesex in 1940. Uxbridge is a university town in the London Borough of Hillingdon in West London, England. Middlesex is one of the 39 historic counties of England and the second smallest by area.

Typefaces

Gill Sans, Gill's most famous typeface
Gill Sans, Gill's most famous typeface

Eric Gill's types include:

In his 1947–1949 redesign for Penguin Books, a project that resulted in the establishment of Penguin Composition Rules, Jan Tschichold specified use of Gill Sans for book titles, and in branding their Pelican imprint. Gill Sans is a humanist Sans-serif Typeface designed by Eric Gill in 1927 and released 1928 Perpetua is a Typeface that was designed by British sculptor typeface designer stonecutter and printmaker Eric Gill (1882–1940 Golden Cockerel Press was a major English Private press operating between 1920 and 1961 Joanna is an old style Serif Typeface designed by Eric Gill (1882–1940 in the period 1930–31 and named for one of his daughters Penguin Books is a British Publisher founded in 1935 by Allen Lane. Jan Tschichold ( April 2 1902 Leipzig, Germany &ndash August 11 1974 Locarno, Switzerland) was In the 1990s, the BBC adopted Gill Sans for its wordmark and many of its on-screen television graphics. A wordmark subset of the term Logotype ' is a standardized graphic representation of the name of a company institution or product name used for purposes of identification

Controversies

Whilst Gill was a deeply religious man, largely following the Roman Catholic faith, his beliefs and practices were by no means orthodox. His personal diaries describe his sexual activity in great detail including the fact that Gill sexually abused his own children, had an incestuous relationship with his sister and performed sexual acts on his dog. This aspect of Gill's life was little known until publication of the 1989 biography by Fiona MacCarthy. Fiona MacCarthy (born January 23, 1940) is a British biographer and cultural historian Robert Speaight's earlier biography mentioned none of it. Robert Speaight (1904 – 1976 was a British actor and writer and the brother of George Speaight the puppeteer

As the revelations about Gill's private life resonated, there was a reassessment of his personal and artistic achievement. As his recent biographer sums up: "After the initial shock, […] as Gill's history of adulteries, incest, and experimental connection with his dog became public knowledge in the late 1980s, the consequent reassessment of his life and art left his artistic reputation strengthened. Gill emerged as one of the twentieth century's strangest and most original controversialists, a sometimes infuriating, always arresting spokesman for man's continuing need of God in an increasingly materialistic civilization, and for intellectual vigour in an age of encroaching triviality. "[3]

Selected writings

References

Notes

  1. ^ C. f. Donald Potter, My Time with Eric Gill: A Memoir, Gamecock Press, 1980, ISBN 0-9506205-1-3.
  2. ^ C. f. Christopher Skelton (ed. ), Eric Gill, The Engravings, Herbert Press, 1990, ISBN 1-871569-15-X.
  3. ^ Fiona MacCarthy, "Gill, (Arthur) Eric Rowton (1882–1940)", Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004. The Dictionary of National Biography ( DNB) is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history published from 1885

External links

Persondata
NAME Gill, Arthur Eric Rowton
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gill, Eric
SHORT DESCRIPTION British sculptor, typeface designer, stonecutter, printmaker
DATE OF BIRTH 22 February 1882
PLACE OF BIRTH Brighton, Sussex, England
DATE OF DEATH 17 November 1940
PLACE OF DEATH Uxbridge, Middlesex, England
Events 1495 - King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne Year 1882 ( MDCCCLXXXII) was a Common year starting on Sunday (link will display the full calendar of the Gregorian calendar (or a Common Brighton ( is a town on the south coast of England and with its neighbour Hove, forms the city of Brighton and Hove. Sussex is a historic county in South East England corresponding roughly in area to the ancient Kingdom of Sussex. England is a Country which is part of the United Kingdom. Its inhabitants account for more than 83% of the total UK population whilst its mainland Events 284 - Diocletian is proclaimed emperor by his soldiers Year 1940 ( MCMXL) was a Leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full 1940 calendar of the Gregorian calendar. Uxbridge is a university town in the London Borough of Hillingdon in West London, England. Middlesex is one of the 39 historic counties of England and the second smallest by area.
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