Talk:Gwen Raverat

Suicide?

According to Russell Davies's biography of Ronald Searle, Gwen Raverat (whom Searle knew) committed suicide. Is this true? Could anyone who knows any details from a reliable source add them to this article? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.225.21.78 (talk) 08:37, 16 October 2009 (UTC)

Family Tree

ALL of the grandchildren have now been accounted for, but the spouses of three grandchildren: Charles, Gwendoline, and Ruth are currently 'missing': of the second generation of the Darwin family (grandchildren of Charles and Emma) the following three graves have NOT yet been located: Lady Katherine Darwin, nee Pember, wife of Sir Charles Galton Darwin; Jacques Pierre Paul Raverat (husband of Gwen Raverat, nee Darwin) and also William Rees-Thomas (husband of Ruth Rees – Thomas, nee Darwin). (Unfortunately the grave of Erasmus Darwin (1881-1915), son of Sir Horace and Lady 'Ida' Darwin, was destroyed during WWI.) Of these three, Jacques Raverat is more than likely to be the most difficult to find in France, the other two are somewhere in England! Any help in finding these three is to be much appreciated?

'Darwinian Gravedigger' 2.30.187.198 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 14:16, 20 January 2016 (UTC)

Wood engravings

I've always understood the Raverat was a woodcutter, not an engraver, as in her contribution to Dodgson's Contemporary English Woodcuts, and her issue in the series Modern Woodcutters. Perhaps people don't care about the semantics but they are 2 different techniques, one using a knife and the other a graver. Labocetta (talk) 18:14, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

@Labocetta: our 'Wood engraving' article says that a wood engraving is a variety of a woodcut, so Raverat's contribution to Contemporary English Woodcuts may have been wood engravings. Her being a founder member of the Society of Wood Engravers suggests that she made wood engravings. I'm not an expert on the techniques, but she may have made wood engravings as well as other types of woodcut. Also, 'woodcutter' makes me think of Hansel and Gretel's father – if we add or change to 'woodcutter' we should try to avoid ambiguity. Verbcatcher (talk) 23:35, 15 March 2023 (UTC)

The British Museum list her as a wood engraver. https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/BIOG43171 Erp (talk) 01:19, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

As I said people don't seem bothered by semantics, but they are 2 entirely different methods of producing a print. A woodcut is a Relief print i.e the image is drawn on the wood and all the surrounding wood is cut away, leaving only the image standing proud, so that is all that receives ink. A woodengraving is an Intaglio print with the image cut into the wood, so all the surface wood remains in place except where it has been removed for the image. The ink is then applied & the surface wiped off, leaving the ink only in the engraved image. Details of these processes are given in Bamber Gascoigne's How to Identify Prints Labocetta (talk) 20:28, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

The British Museum definitions are at https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/x12424

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/x12426 BTW Dodgson's Contemporary English Woodcuts is online and it describes her as doing wood engravings. https://archive.org/details/contemporaryengl00dodg/page/n15/mode/2up?q=raverat The V&A has three works by her one of which is described as a wood engraving (https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O585403/print-raverat-gwendoline-mary/) and one as a woodcut (no picture). I would expect reputable museums to be precise in their word usage. As @Verbcatcher mentioned it is entirely possible she did work in several different techniques (and she definitely painted) though she is certainly best known for her wood engravings. Erp (talk) 21:22, 19 March 2023 (UTC)

Well I despair when even the BM gets it wrong. To say that wood engraving is a type of relief printing is a contradiction in terms. And to say that the only difference between a woodcut & woodengraving is where it is cut is even more misleading. Woodengraving on the hard end wood allows for fine detail to be achieved. Fine detail is not really achievable in a woodcut on the plank wood because it is soft and as you are leaving the image in relief it is hard to achieve fine lines Labocetta (talk) 10:10, 31 March 2023 (UTC)