Lynd Ward

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Lynd Kendall Ward (born June 26, 1905 , † June 28, 1985 ) was an American artist and author . Lynd Ward illustrated about 200 children's and adult books. He was a father of the graphic novel who told stories without words just through his woodcut art. Ward also used other techniques, such as ink , watercolor and oil , made lithographs and made etchings using the mezzotint technique.

Life

Ward grew up in Illinois, Massachusetts, and New Jersey. His father was the Methodist preacher and well-known politician Harry F. Ward . Lynd Ward reportedly knew early on that he was going to be an artist when he realized his name was read backwards to be draw. He studied art education at Columbia University in New York. There he met his future wife May McNeer. They married after graduation (1926) and spent their first year of marriage in Europe, where Ward studied printing technology and book design with Hans Alexander Müller at the Leipzig Art Academy. He saw a book by the Belgian wood cutter and illustrator Frans Masereel and took over his idea of ​​telling stories without words. Ward's first book, the purely graphic novel Gods' Man , was published in October 1929, the week of the stock market crash. The Man or Man of the Gods was a purely visual story that was realized entirely through woodblock prints. He produced a total of six such woodcut books, the last and most elaborate being Vertigo (1937).

Ward used various techniques to illustrate over a hundred children's books, some of which were created with his wife, May McNeer. Ward was later a sought-after illustrator for the Heritage Book Club (from 1938), which produced classic editions ( Heritage Limited Editions Club ). Ward made no secret of his socialist convictions in his work and acted according to them. In 1932, in the middle of the Great Depression , he founded the publishing cooperative Equinox Cooperative Press .

Ward was a member of the Society of Illustrators and the Society of American Graphic Arts . In 1958, Lynd Ward was elected a full member ( NA ) of the National Academy of Design . He received a number of awards, including the Library of Congress Award for woodcut, the Caldecott Medal and an award for outstanding achievement in the category of children's books from the Rutgers University ( Distinguished Contribution to Children's Literature ). Six of his books received the Newbery Honor Medal and two a simple Newbery Medal . Ward retired to Reston, Virginia in 1979 . He died on June 28, 1985.

Books without words

A woodcut by Lynd Ward; Plate 29 in Prelude to a Million Years

In his first book, Gods' Man (1929), he mixed Art Nouveau and Expressionism to tell of the artist's struggles with his art, the deceptive lure of money and fame that he can only escape by attaining a new innocence. This book was also a bow to Frans Masereel and Otto Nückel . It had a lasting influence, for example on Allen Ginsberg .

The woodcut books
  • Gods' Man (1929)
  • Madman's Drum (1930)
  • Wild Pilgrimage (1932)
  • Prelude to a Million Years (1933)
  • Song Without Words (1936)
  • Vertigo (1937)

There was another unfinished book in his estate and his 26 woodcuts (out of 44 planned) were published as Lynd Ward's Last, Unfinished, Wordless Novel (2001).

He also painted a children's book in shades of gray without words, The Silver Pony (1973). There are African American and Indian characters in this book.

More work

Ward's woodcuts also illustrated Alec Waugh's travelogue Hot Countries and a copy of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein . The children's book The Biggest Bear , which he illustrated , received the Caldecott Medal ( The Biggest Bear ) in 1953. Other well-known works by Ward are his pictures for Esther Forbes ' Johnny Tremain and The Little Red Lighthouse and the Great Gray Bridge (text Hildegarde Swift ) (1942).

Ward accused of racism. In Wild Pilgrimage he portrayed lynching , and his political sympathy for African Americans is evident in the work for North Star Shining: A Pictorial History of the American Negro , by Hildegarde Hoyt Swift (1947).

Aftermath

The American comic artist and theorist Art Spiegelman wrote "a few thousand words over six books that do not contain a single one" on the work of Lynd Ward . The essay was translated by Andreas Platthaus and printed in the FAZ .

Work editions

In 1972 all six woodcut books were published by Abrams under the title Storyteller Without Words . Ward broke his usual silence and gave the books brief introductions.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ "Lynd Ward." Authors and Artists for Young Adults . Vol. 80. Gale, 2009. Repr. In: Biography Resource Center . Retrieved January 1, 2010.
  2. ↑ nationalacademy.org: Past Academicians "W" / Ward, Lynd Kendal NA 1958 ( Memento of the original from August 14, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (accessed on July 20, 2015) @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.nationalacademy.org
  3. ↑ Allen Ginsberg, Illuminated Poems, illus, Eric Drooker (New York: Four Walls, 1996), xii
  4. ↑ http://www.bpib.com/lyndward.htm
  5. ^ FAZ of October 9, 2010, pages Z1 and Z3. Read the picture!

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Ward, Lynd
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ward, Lynd Kendall (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American artist and author
DATE OF BIRTH June 26, 1905
DATE OF DEATH June 28, 1985