Eric Gill

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Nude woman reclining on a leopard skin, a graphite drawing by Gill (1928)

Arthur Eric Rowton Gill (February 22, 1882 – November 17, 1940) was a British sculptor, typographer and printmaker , mostly in engraving.

Biography

Gill was born in 1882 in Brighton, Sussex (now East Sussex). In 1902 he attended classes, studying lettering under the calligrapher Edward Johnston at the Central School of Arts and Crafts in London.

In 1906, he married, and the following year he moved with his family to Hopkin's Crank [or Sopers?], a house in an artists' community at Ditchling in Sussex, where he started producing sculpture. His first public success was Mother and Child (1912). In 1914 he produced sculptures for the stations of the cross in Westminster Cathedral. In the same year he met the typographer Stanley Morison. After the war, together with Hilary Pepler and Desmond Chute, Gill founded The Guild of St Joseph and St Dominic at Ditchling, Sussex where his pupils included the young David Jones, who soon began a relationship with Gill's daughter, Petra.

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. In 1925 he designed the Perpetua typeface, with the uppercase based upon monumental Roman inscriptions, for Morison, who was working for the Monotype Corporation. This was followed by the Gill Sans typeface in 1927–30, based on the sans-serif lettering originally designed by Johnston for London Underground. In the period 1930-31 Gill designed the typeface Joanna which he used to handset his book An Essay on Typography.

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. 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. Other apprentices included Laurie Cribb, Donald Potter (see My time with Eric Gill: a memoir, Gamecock Press, 1980, ISBN 0-9506205-1-3) and Walter Ritchie. 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. 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 by the Royal Society of Arts and became a founder-member of the newly established Faculty of Royal Designers for Industry. The award of RDI is the highest British award for designers.

A deeply religious man, Eric Gill published numerous essays on the relationship between art and religion. He also produced a number of erotic engravings, reprinted as Eric Gill, the engravings, Herbert Press, 1990, ISBN 1-871569-15-X.

Gill died in Uxbridge, Middlesex in 1940. His headstone, on his grave near Pigotts, identifies him simply as a "stone carver" [1].

References

• Bringhurst, Robert. The Elements of Typographic Style. Hartley & Marks: 1992. ISBN 0-88179-033-8.
• Dodd, Robin. From Gutenberg to OpenType. Hartley & Marks: 2006. ISBN 0-88179-020-1.
• Fiedl, Frederich, Nicholas Ott and Bernard Stein. Typography: An Encyclopedic Survey of Type Design and Techniques Through History. Black Dog & Leventhal: 1998. ISBN 1-57912-023-7.
• Kindserley, David. Mr. Eric Gill: Further Thoughts by an Apprentice. Cardozo Kindersley Editions: 1967, 1982. ISBN 0-9501046-5-4.

Incest, Sexual Abuse of his children and sex with animals

According to the 1989 biography by Fiona MacCarthy, Gill's devout Roman Catholicism did not prevent him sexually abusing his own children, having an incestuous relationship with his sister or performing sexual acts on his dog. His personal diaries describe, in great detail, his sexual activity, which he noted in his diary thus "continued experiment with dog" , ‘stayed ½ hour – put p **** in her a *** ’” referring to an attack on his younger daughter. . Robert Speaight's earlier biography mentioned none of this.

Legacy

Apart from Gill Sans, which is his most famous creation and lasting legacy to typography, Gill also designed the typefaces Perpetua (1926), Golden Cockerel Roman (1929), Solus (1929), Joanna (based on work by Granjon; 1930–1931), Aries (1932), Floriated Capitals (1932), Bunyan (1934), Pilgrim (recut version of Bunyan; 1953) and Jubilee (1934).

In the 1990s, the BBC adopted Gill Sans for its logo and many of its on-screen television graphics.

Quotations

Art is skill, that is the first meaning of the word.

"That state is a state of Slavery in which a man does what he likes to do in his spare time and in his working time that which is required of him. This state can only exist when what a man likes to do is to please himself.

"That state is a state of Freedom in which a man does what he likes to do in his working time and in his spare time that which is required of him. That state can only exist when what a man likes to do is to please God."

— from Art Nonsense and Other Essays (1929)

First I think and then I draw my think. quoted in My time with Eric Gill by Donald Potter, 1980

Pupils of Eric Gill

Gill's pupils include William Bloye, Don Potter and David Kindersley

Selected writings

• Gill, Eric: A Holy Tradition of Working: An Anthology of Writings, Golgonooza Press, 1983, ISBN 0-903880-30-X
• Gill, Eric: An Essay on Typography, 1931, ISBN 0-87923-762-7, ISBN 0-87923-950-6 (reprints)
• Gill, Eric: Christianity and Art, 1927
• Gill, Eric: Art, 1934
• Gill, Eric: Work and Property, 1937
• Gill, Eric: Work and Culture, 1938
• Gill, Eric: Autobiography: Quod Ore Sumpsimus, Jonathan Cape, 1940 (published posthumously) ISBN 1-870495-13-6

References

• Attwater, Donal: A Cell of Good Living, 1969
• Collins, Judith: Eric Gill — The Sculpture, 1998
• Steven Corey and Julia MacKenzie (editors) — Eric Gill: A Bibliography, St Paul's Bibliographies, 1991, ISBN 0-906795-53-2
• Gill, Cecil, Warde & Kindersley; The Life and Works of Eric Gill, 1968
• Evan Gill and David Peace (editors) — Eric Gill: The Inscriptions, Herbert Press, 1994, ISBN 1-871569-66-4
• Holliday, Peter: Eric Gill in Ditchling, Oak Knoll Press, ISBN 1-58456-075-4
• MacCarthy, Fiona: Eric Gill, Faber & Faber, 1989, ISBN 0-571-14302-4
• Skelton, Christopher, Editor: Eric Gill — The Engravings, 1983
• Speaight, Robert: Life of Eric Gill, 1966
• Thorp, Joseph: Eric Gill, 1929
• Yorke, Malcolm: Eric Gill — Man of Flesh and Spirit, 1981
• Robert Harling: "The letter forms and type designs of Eric Gill", 1976, ISBN 0-903696-04-5
• Jonathan Miles: Eric Gill & David Jones at Capel-y-ffin, 1992, Poetry Wales Press, ISBN 1-85411-051-9

See also

• Typography
• Wood engraving

External links

• Examples of Gill's work at the Tate Gallery.
• Identifont biography
• article on Gill's private life in relation to his work by Fiona MacCarthy