Publisher/Manufacturer: St George's Gallery Prints, 7 Cork St. London Series title: Rhondda Suite (plate 2)
1960 Etching with aquatint in black, with hand colour, on white Hodgkinson handmade Waterleaf paper
504 x 500 mm. Purchase: The artist 1987 Funding support: Catherine Lewis and V & A
Artist's proof. Printed in an edition of 50, plus 5 artist's proofs. Steel-faced zinc plate still extant. The 'Rhondda Suite', a set of 7 etchings, was commissioned by Robert Erskine and published on 03/08/1960. The original set was printed by John Brunsdon at the Etching Studio in Welwyn Garden City. The prints were published both as a portfolio set, numbered 1 to 10, or as individual prints, numbered 11 to 50. 'First Building' was individually priced at 10 guineas in the 1960 exhibition at St George's Gallery Prints. This particular print was printed by Gareth Jones. See PR1522 and PR1523 for the title and contents pages. Drawn directly onto the plate in situ. The print depicts the first Gentlemen's Public Lavatory on entering the lower Rhondda Valley at Trehafod
Townscape / street scene with public toilets at Trehafod, Rhondda; foreground, a bubble car on a road and a high brick wall; middleground, two pedestrians on a pavement, a Gentlemen's Public Lavatory, advertisements featuring a circus elephant and faces, a railway signal, a signal box, industrial buildings and three telegraph poles; background, distant hills. Dust-ground aquatint used for dark areas of hills and toilets. Vigorous hatching is used elsewhere for tone. Some stopping out and burnished highlights. Textured fabric has been pressed on to the ground on the plate. All areas below the horizon are hand coloured with water-based brown ink applied by a large soft brush. Text on image, advertisements, 'CIRCUS', 'M&B EXPORT [in reverse] ITS MARVELOUS BEER' and 'MILLION GUINMER[?]'