William Nicholson [antikvár]

WILLIAM NICHOLSON illiam nicholson was born at Newark-on-Trent in 1865, the son of William Newzam Nicholson and his wife Anne Elizabeth (nee Prior). He early displayed his creative gifts and was sent to the Herkomer School of Art. His study therein was, however, of brief duration, for in his own words he was "chucked out for bad work and poor attendance". During his school days he had special lessons from Cubley of Newark, who had been trained by Sir William Beechey, who was a pupil of Sir Joshua Reynolds. In his early twenties he went to Julien's in Paris, where he worked on and oíf for a year, but derived little benefit, sinee the classes were much too crowded and the circumstances difhcult. On his return to England he married the sister of the late James Pryde. Calling themselves J. and W. Beggarstaff, Nicholson and Pryde worked on a series of posters which created new aesthetic standards in commercial art. Nicholson con-siders tliat ainong other advantages gained from this work was knowledge of the use of pattern. He then turnéd to woodcuts and produced Nicholson s Alphabet, London Types, The Square Book of Animals, The Almanach of Twelve Sports (with verses by Kipling), Characters of Románcé; and two series of Twelve Portraits, well-known figures of the period (Lord Roberts, Sarah Bernhardt, Kipling, Whistler), and (piate 2), the famous Queen Victoria, and a folio of the Oxford Colleges. The woodcuts were works of striking individu-ality and of singular assurance of execution, an assurance all the more remarkable in that Nicholson hadn't (as he hasn't since) received any instruction whatever in the use of this médium, nor, indeed, so much as watched another artist at work in it. These were days very much in the great and honourable tradi-