Paul Landacre

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Paul Hambleton Landacre (9 July 1893, Columbus, Ohio-1963) was a groundbreaking American printmaker and engraver.

Contents

[edit] Biography

While a student at Ohio State University, Landacre was a track and field champion, however, he contracted a streptococcus infection which left him crippled for life. Upon graduation in 1916, he relocated to southern California. He soon began a career in a San Diego advertising agency and in about 1922 settled in Los Angeles where he remained. He studied at the Otis College of Art and Design (1923-26), where he later taught, but he taught himself the demanding art of wood engraving. In 1926 he quit his job as a commercial artist to concentrate on printmaking.

He and his wife Margaret moved to a house in El Moran in Los Angeles in March of 1932. Many of his engravings were inspired by the landscape around the house, which was declared a City of Los Angeles landmark (Historic Cultural Monument No. 839) in March 2006.

Landacre developed a very individual and refined style of fine white lines, delicate cross hatching and flecking in contrast with large dark areas. Inspired by the California landscape, he created sensual interpretations of plant and animal life in increasingly abstract designs.

With the exception of a few published prints, Landacre printed all of his own wood engravings and his finest prints are now very rare.

Landacre died in 1963, due to complications of a suicide attempt made soon after Margaret died. His papers and artwork are housed at the William Andrews Clark Memorial Library at UCLA.[1]

[edit] Books

  • California Hills
  • Flowering Earth: Wood Engravings by Paul Landacre (1939)
  • Peattie, Donald C., A Natural History of Trees of Eastern and Central North America, Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1950; 2nd ed 1966; Reprint as trade paperback with intro by Robert Finch, 1991.
  • Peattie, Donald C., A Natural History of Western Trees, Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1953; Reprint as trade paperback with intro by Robert Finch, 1991.

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ "Register of the Paul Landacre Papers and Artwork, ca. 1915-1983" http://www.oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf9v19p2h7

[edit] References

  • Lehman, Anthony L. (1983), Paul Landacre: A Life and a Legacy, Dawson's Book Shop.
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