Cyril Power, The Sunshine Roof, Prints by Bookroom Art Press

Description:

Linocut (1934). Printed from four blocks: Yellow; Warm Brown; Viridian; Prussian Blue. This print originated from the experience of a bus trip made by Power, with his second son, Cyril Arthur Power, driving the Green Line bus on a trip between London and Hereford. Power was encouraged by Claude Flight (see Biography) to produce work that depicted speed and movement and the modern, in all its glory: ‘This speeding up of life in general’, wrote Flight, ‘is one of the interesting and psychologically important features of today…Traffic problems, transport problems, everyone is on the rush, either for work or pleasure….The Painter cannot but be influenced by the restlessness of his surroundings’*.

We can take it from the circumstances of the ride, from the title of the linocut, and from the sheer vibrancy of this print, that the artist’s experience of speed as depicted here was certainly one of pleasure, rather than displeasure.

*Claude Flight: ‘Dynamism and the Colour Print’, 1925.