id: 153327 accession number: 1986.39 share license status: Copyrighted url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1986.39 updated: 2023-03-14 12:01:31.190000 Tillers of the Soil, 1934. Sybil Andrews (Canadian, 1898–1992). Linoleum cut; The Cleveland Museum of Art, Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland 1986.39 © Glenbow-Alberta Institute, 2010 title: Tillers of the Soil title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1934 creation date earliest: 1934 creation date latest: 1934 current location: creditline: Gift of The Print Club of Cleveland copyright: © Glenbow-Alberta Institute, 2010 --- culture: Canada, 20th century technique: linoleum cut department: Prints collection: PR - Linocut type: Print find spot: catalogue raisonne: White 31 --- CREATORS * Sybil Andrews (Canadian, 1898–1992) - artist --- measurements: state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Year in Review for 1986 opening date: 1987-02-04T05:00:00 Year in Review for 1986. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (February 4-March 15, 1987). title: Against the Grain: Woodcuts from the Collection opening date: 2003-08-17T00:00:00 Against the Grain: Woodcuts from the Collection. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (August 17-November 9, 2003). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS --- PROVENANCE --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: Claude Flight, an instructor at the Grosvenor School of Modern Art in London, appreciated linoleum's unique characteristics, popularizing the floor covering as an important printmaking medium in the 1910s. Like a woodcut, a linocut is a relief technique. A knife or gouge is used to cut away the background, leaving the lines standing in relief. The surface of the block is then inked and printed, sometimes by hand. Because linoleum is supple, easily incised, cheap, and readily available, its use quickly became widespread. Andrews, Flight's most important and famous student, chose subjects from everyday life. Using bold lines and flat shapes printed as bright masses of color, she exploited the fact that linoleum is easy to cut in fluid lines and has a lightly textured surface. Like Tillers of the Soil, Grosvenor school linocuts purposefully look handmade. Despising printing with a press, which obtained "deplorably mechanical[,]" mass-produced prints, Flight continued to espouse the 19th-century arts-and-crafts tradition of William Morris, emphasizing printing by hand to retain the personal expression of the artist. --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS --- IMAGES