Gill, Eric, 1882-1940

Name Entries

Information

person

Name Entries *

Gill, Eric, 1882-1940

Computed Name Heading

Name Components

Surname :

Gill

Forename :

Eric

Date :

1882-1940

eng

Latn

authorizedForm

rda

Gill, Eric (Arthur Eric Rowton), 1882-1940

Computed Name Heading

Name Components

Surname :

Gill

Forename :

Eric

NameExpansion :

Arthur Eric Rowton

Date :

1882-1940

eng

Latn

alternativeForm

rda

Gill, Eric (A. E. R. G.), 1882-1940

Computed Name Heading

Name Components

Surname :

Gill

Forename :

Eric

NameAddition :

(A. E. R. G.)

Date :

1882-1940

eng

Latn

alternativeForm

rda

Gill, Arthur Eric Rowton Peter Joseph, 1882-1940

Computed Name Heading

Name Components

Surname :

Gill

Forename :

Arthur Eric Rowton Peter Joseph

Date :

1882-1940

eng

Latn

alternativeForm

rda

Genders

Exist Dates

Exist Dates - Date Range

1882-02-22

1882 February 22

Birth

1940-11-17

1940 November 17

Death

Show Fuzzy Range Fields

Biographical History

English sculptor and engraver.

Arthur Eric Rowton Gill, best known as Eric Gill, was born in Brighton, Sussex on February 22, 1882 to minister Arthur Tidman Gill and light-opera singer (Cicely) Rose King. They moved to Chichester in 1897, where Gill studied at the Chichester Technical and Art School (1897-1900). In 1900, Gill moved to London to study architecture under William Douglas Caröe, taking classes in practical masonry at Westminster Institute and in lettering and illumination at the Central School of Art and Design. He was inspired by calligrapher Edward Johnston. Gill received several commissions for three-dimensional inscriptions in stone, and in 1903 ended his studies with Caröe to pursue his work in lettering under E. S. Prior of the Art Workers’ Guild.

In 1904 Gill married Ethel Hester Morse; they had three daughters (Elizabeth, Petra, and Joanna) and adopted a son (Gordion). He began teaching both letterwork and masonry, and in 1906 was elected to the Arts & Crafts Exhibition Society. Around this time, he traveled to see stoneworking in Rome, Bruges, and Chartres.

In 1907 Gill moved his family to Ditchling, Sussex, where he formed an artistic community and expanded his stonework to include sculpture. The first solo exhibition of Gill's stone carvings was in January 1911 at the Chenil Gallery in Chelsea, followed by inclusion of his pieces in the Second Post-Impressionist Exhibition (1912-1913) at the Grafton Galleries in London. The success of his sculptures on public buildings and World War I memorials in the nineteen-teens and -twenties– including his stations of the Cross for Westminster Catheldral (1914-1918)–is credited with the ensuing English revival of direct-carving stone.

In 1913 Gill and his wife converted to Catholicism, she adopted the name Mary, and they both become lay members of the Dominican Order. Fellow Catholic convert and printer Hilary Douglas Clark Pepler joined Gill’s community at Ditchling and established St. Dominic’s Press (approximately 1916). In collaboration with Pepler and artist Desmond Chute, Gill formalized the Ditchling community into the Guild of St. Joseph and St. Dominic in 1921. Gill contributed extensive illustrations and lettering for many of the St. Dominic Press’s publications.

In 1924, due to a disagreement with Pepler, Gill relocated and established a new Catholic craft community in Capel-y-ffin, a former monastery in the Welsh Black Mountains. While at Capel-y-ffin, Gill began working with Beatrice Warde and Stanley Morison of the Monotype Corporation, designing typefaces that impacted twentieth-century typography: Perpetua, Gill Sans, Joanna, and Solus. He continued to receive commissions for sculptural work, creating The Sleeping Christ (1925), Deposition (1925), and Mankind (1927). Also during this time, he began engraving illustrations for books printed by the Golden Cockerel Press.

Capel-y-ffin's geographic remoteness proved challenging, and in 1928 the Gills moved to Piggots, near High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire. There Gill took on a number of large-scale sculptural jobs, including a series of carvings for the BBC Broadcasting House in London (1931), and the League of Nations building in Geneva (1935-1938). He continued to illustrate for Golden Cockerel Press and established the Hague and Gill Press with his son-in-law René Hague.

Gill authored many books over his lifetime, including: Christianity and Art (1927), Art and a Changing Civilization (1934), Money and Morals (1934), Work and Leisure (1935), The Necessity of Belief (1936), Work and Property (1937), and Eric Gill: Autobiography (1941).

After years of declining health, Gill died from lung cancer in Uxbridge on November 17, 1940. Several of his final works were incomplete at the time of his death and were finished by other artists, including the stations of the cross for St Alban's Church in Oxford and the stone altarpiece for Westminster Cathedral.

Some of Gill’s work was controversial during his lifetime due to political ideology (“Cleansing of the Temple” frieze for University of Leeds) or sexual content within the context of religion (the illustrations for Golden Cockerel Press’s The Song of Songs). Public awareness of Gill's adultery, incest, and sexual abuse of his two eldest daughters raised by Fiona MacCarthy's Eric Gill: A Lover’s Quest for Art and God. (1989), a biography which used his diaries as source material, led to a critical reassessment of Gill’s legacy.

eng

Latn

External Related CPF

https://viaf.org/viaf/99946273

https://viaf.org/viaf/36934216

https://www.wikidata.org/entity/Q551426

https://www.worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n50027765

https://id.loc.gov/authorities/n50027765

Other Entity IDs (Same As)

Sources

Loading ...

Resource Relations

Loading ...

Internal CPF Relations

Loading ...

Languages Used

eng

Zyyy

Subjects

Art

Art and religion

Art, British

Artists

Artists

Catholic artists

Arts

Authors, English

Book designers

Bookplates, English

Books

Catholics

Clothing and dress

Devotional literature

Draft

Drawing, English

Engravers

Engraving, English

Lettering

Lettering

Manuscripts

Private presses

Sculptors

Sculptors

Sculpture

Small press books

Small presses

Social sciences

Stone cutters

War and society

Wood-engraving

Wood-engraving, English

Work

Nationalities

Britons

Activities

Occupations

Designer

Engravers

Illustrator

Typographers

Legal Statuses

Places

England

ENG, GB

AssociatedPlace

Citizenship

Convention Declarations

<conventionDeclaration><citation>VIAF</citation></conventionDeclaration>

General Contexts

Structure or Genealogies

Mandates

Identity Constellation Identifier(s)

w6m72c6t

87861819