Brief Life of Sybil Andrews, Modernist Linocut Printmaker

Sybil Andrews was born in Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk on 19th April 1898. Her family had long-established links with the town, one of her ancestors being Walter Tyrrell who had been accused of the death of King William Rufus.

The young Sybil became familiar with watercolours from an early age. Her parents presented her with a paintbox to keep her amused. Her interest fuelled, she later attended the local art school and began drawing from plaster casts.

At the end of the war Sybil Andrews moved to London’s Chelsea where she attended Heatherley’s School of Fine Art. Here she met Cyril Power. He was an architect by trade and an artist. Twenty years her senior, they began an artistic partnership that would last until the beginning of the Second World War.

After Heatherley, Sybil worked as the secretary at a newly-opened school, The Grosvenor School of Modern Art. She was able to attend classes, in particular Claude Flight’s lectures on the art of the linocut print.

The Grosvenor School was looked on with suspicion by the artistic establishment. It was innovative and open to modernist ideas from Europe. In the heightened atmosphere of post-war nationalism, such ideas were seen as subversive.

Claude Flight was an important influence on Sybil Andrews and under him she perfected the art of linocut printmaking.

This technique was not new; it was used in the early 20th century by some German Expressionists and by members of the Russian Constructivist movement. Claude Flight’s new technique meant that his students could create linocuts using more than one colour, with a different block for each colour.

In 1938 Sybil Andrews moved to the New Forest. Once again, the outbreak of war offered an interesting work opportunity – this time boat-building for the British Power Boat Company at Hythe, near Southampton.

Sybil enjoyed this work, receiving full training and working equally with male colleagues. The company gave her permission to make notes of the boats being built. These sketches were used for a series of seven canvases which can now be seen in the RAF Museum, Hendon.

Whilst working in the shipyard Andrews met Walter Morgan. They were married in 1947.Like many others, the couple found life after the war difficult and they decided to move to British Columbia in Canada.

Sybil Andrews and Walter settled in a remote area of British Columbia, Campbell River. As well as becoming a well-respected teacher and mentor, she was a recognised artist in Canada, becoming a member of the Canadian Painter Etchers and the Print and Drawing Council of Canada.

Her work, some freely donated by Sybil herself, is in many Canadian public galleries as well as the British Museum, the Victoria & Albert Museum, the Clock House Museum in Bury St Edmunds and the Los Angeles Museum, to name a few.

The Glenbow Museum in Calgary owns a significant number of Sybil Andrews works, including plates, prints, sketches, and her tools.

I came across this link to a video of Gary Ratushniak, a pupil of Sybil Andrews, demonstrating the art of his linocuts and explaining how he was influenced by Sybil yet modified his techniques.  It is a fascinating insight into this delicate art.

Sybil Andrews died in 1992 aged almost ninety-five. Her influence as a lino-cut printmaker, along with her mentor, Claude Flight and the Grosvenor School, is now recognised world-wide.

In addition, her enthusiasm as a teacher meant that, until one month before her death, Sybil Andrews was still teaching her art class in Campbell River.

Sources:

• "Obituary: Sybil Andrews", The Independent online, 28th December 1992
• Mayberry Fine Art, Canadian Art Dealer online
• Art and the Aesthete blog
• The Glenbow Museum online