The Arts and Crafts movement originated in England, around the second part of the 19th century, and was birthed out of a few artists’ revulsion towards the industrialisation of the world– and consequently, art– around them. The Industrial Revolution and its mass-machinery had brought efficiency into the art-making realm, but had sacrificed craftsmanship and beauty in the process. This caused much dissatisfaction launched a movement that stubbornly defied the changing times and harkened back to the medieval era, when craftsmanship was thought to be in its prime; English designer William Morris led the charge by setting up a firm of artists and manufacturers who were dedicated to breathing new life into different areas of design and reviving the painstaking processes involved in creating such art.
Walter Crane (1845-1915) was one such artist. An English artist and book illustrator, he was heavily involved in the Arts and Crafts movement, and is responsible for the creation of some of the most …show more content…
The careful eye for muted but gorgeous colours, the ability to capture such uncanny lifelikeness and movement with only paint and careful brushstrokes; Crane showed telltale signs of a great artist, even at his young age. Linton must have agreed, as it was the coloured design plans of this very painting that convinced the illustrious artist to take Crane under his wing, and even assist him in earning commissions, such as the illustrations for J. R. Wise’s book The New Forest: Its History and its Scenery (1862). (Pook Press) It was then that Wise, a political and religious radical, introduced Crane to the works of John Ruskin, who was to have a great impact on Crane as a person and as an artist, as well as on the forthcoming Arts and Crafts