Title

Mr. A.B. Webb’s colour woodcuts

Author

Author not identified

Source

The Studio (London).

Details

November 1926.

Publication date

1926

Type

Article

Language

English

Country of context

Australia

Full text

Mr. A. B. Webb’s colour woodcuts.

There is something extremely invigorating in the thought of an artist's perseverance in his craft in the face of every kind of practical difficulty, especially when his efforts in the end produce something worth while. Such a phenomenon is another instance of the eternal conflict of mind with matter, a conflict which too often ends in the extinction of stultification of mind. Keats, Chatterton, Beardsley, all succumbed, but not before they had added an imperishable contribution to our riches. Yet how many must give up the struggle without ever having scored a single success? How many must desert to the enemy? How few would be capable, like Vierge, of starting all over again after a crushing blow! Vierge's right arm became paralysed: well, he set to and worked with his left.

The maker of the colour woodcuts here shown, Mr. A. B. Webb, has taken many a buffet from fate, but has at length succeeded in producing something worth while. Trained in art at the St. Martin's School in London, he worked for some time as a free lance in the Capital City, but some twelve years ago his health necessitated his emigration to Western Australia, where he is now to be found, acting as one of the instructors at the Perth Technical School. There is but a mere handful of professional artists in this part of the world; they see little of the work produced in the more populous Eastern states of Australia, and no European work whatever, save a few etchings, and reproductions in the art magazines.

Mr. Webb commenced his experiments with wood blocks two or three years ago, without the aid of books, and with no tuition from any other artist. He was reduced to crude expedients to obtain registration, and to this day the tools he uses are mostly home-made. His knives are ground out of hacksaw blades, and the small "V" and "U" tools are made from re-tempered umbrella ribs. He experimented first with printing in watercolour mixed with rice and other pastes and mediums, on every available paper, sized and unsized, but eventually he abandoned the process as the right paper was not available. Nothing daunted, Mr. Webb turned to printing with oil colours, and eventually found a suitable paper and medium. The few prints we have seen bear witness to a very admirable sense of design, adapted with skill and sensitiveness to the difficult technique of the woodblock. This form of art is of course dependent for its success on a rigid economy, reinforced by a delicate feeling for tone and colour. Mr. Webb's prints, a few of which we reproduce, are evidence of a poetic reaction to nature, expressed with full command over the technique of the craft.

Published in The Studio (London), 15 November 1926.
© Australianprints, 2004.

Last Updated

13 Aug 2012