John Greenaway by Myles Birket Foster, RWS (1825-1899)

John Greenaway (father of Kate Greenaway), Wood-Engraver, at Work

Myles Birket Foster, R. W. S.

1842

Pencil drawing

15.24x15.24 cm (6x6 in)

Courtesy of the Ivo Da Galen collection, Canada

Text and formatting by Jacqueline Banerjee.

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John Greenaway and Birket Foster were colleagues (see Engen 33), and this unusual portrait focuses on the subject's work almost as much as on the subject himself. Greenaway's concentration is palpable. Both men were important in establishing Kate Greenaway's career. The commercial art site which gives details of this portrait's size and date describes the "miniature drawing" handed down by John Greenaway's son as "the epitome of what one might consider to be Victorian illustration... combining Birket Foster, Kate Greenaway, and both Father and brother John Greenaway; a key item in Kate Greenaway diction" ("Myles Birket Foster").

The two families seem to have been closely linked, and more good was to come of the connection. Birket Foster's son, also named Myles, was a talented musician, and he and Kate Greenaway collaborated on A Day in a Child's Life (1882), for which he supplied the music, and she provided the illustrations. The younger Foster explained later that he assembled all the material first, "then showed the whole thing, already set to music, to Mr. Evans [the printer and wood engraver, another close friend of John Greenaway], and he suggested sending it to K. G., saying that if she liked the idea, she would illustrate it" (qtd. in Spielmann and Layard 100). The result was so popular that it sold 25,000 copies in English-speaking world alone.

This drawing has been reproduced in Spielmann and Layard, facing p.40.

Sources

Engen, Rodney. Kate Greenaway: A Biography. New York: Schocken, 1981.

"Myles Birket Foster." artprice. Web. 13 May 2013.

Spielmann, M. H., and G. S. Layard. Kate Greenaway. London: Adam and Charles Black, 1905. Internet Archive. Web. 13 May 2013.

Last modified 14 July 2015