Tuesday, 28 September 2010

FG Wilkinson

Nothing very extraordinary about going off to San Remo but if you made it to Chefchaouen in Morocco during the 1920s you were nothing if not intrepid. FG Wilkinson was one of the British printmaker-travellers of the time, in company with Mabel Royds, Isabel de B Lockyer and Louise Collier (who got as far as Tangier). I know nothing else about him apart from that.

His linocuts were alot less adventurous. The ravine at San Remo is impressionistic in a Frank Brangwyn way, the views of Chauoen a touch wish-you-here. The saturated blue stylishness the town used to have is missing.

At least the white robes and turbans are authentic. A shame in many ways he wasn't a better observer. The prints are basically OK if old-fashioned in the way they rely on Western perspective for their impact. No hint here of the scale and subtlety of northern Moroccan architecture.

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