Ink and style

I lucky enough to stumble across an original ink drawing in an antique shop recently. The image was in a tatty old frame with no artist listed on the work(image below). On closer inspection, I could just make out the faint remains of the pencil sketch work in places and see the ink nib marks, it had all of the hall marks of an image in the created around the same time and a using similar techniques to that of Sir John Tenniel (19820 – 1914).

So $50 and some research later, I found out the artist was Frank Reyonlds, (1876 – 1953) and the etching created from this drawing appeared in the January 1920 edition of Punch magazine.

The slightly deaf footman (Reynolds, 1920)

 

I love this style of illustration and the work of Reynolds more famous contemporaries, such as E.H. Shepard (1879 – 1976)

Drawn from life (Shepard, 1962)

And Sir John Tenniel (1820 – 1914)

John Tenniel  – self-portrait.

The discovery of Reynolds illustration reminded me of a number of images that I have created using a similar style of line work in recent years. Inspired I set about creating a range of new images both for the pure pleasure of using such a rich illustration style and also to understand the style more deeply.

Here are some of the results;

 

Miffy the Samurai (ink, watercolour and pencil on paper), 2019

Shinobi Pug (ink, watercolour and pencil on paper), 2019

 

Cooking with an octopus (ink, watercolour and pencil on paper), 2019

Just in case your interested and have managed to read this far, here is the print version (as appeared in Punch, Jan 1920) of the illustration that I purchased.

See if you can spot the differences between the original drawing and the finished work.

References:

Reynolds, F. (1920). Slightly Deaf Footman (pp. Ink drawing). London, UK: Punch magazine.

Shepard, E. H. (1962). Drawn from life. Michigan, USA: Dutton.