Painter and printmaker
William Nicholson
Printmaker of bold, simple woodcuts, later the first artist of The Velveteen Rabbit.
On Picturepops™ cards · 2
The life
1872-1949Born Newark-on-Trent, Nottinghamshire, England
William Nicholson was the son of an industrialist and MP in Newark-on-Trent, and studied briefly at Hubert von Herkomer's art school and in Paris. In the 1890s he and his brother-in-law James Pryde designed posters together as "J. & W. Beggarstaff". He then made his name with woodcuts, usually of a single figure in strong outline with a few flat colors, published as books such as An Alphabet (1898) and The Square Book of Animals (1899), with rhymes by Arthur Waugh. He became a well-known painter of portraits and still lifes and was knighted in 1936. In 1922 he illustrated Margery Williams's The Velveteen Rabbit. Picturepops cards use plates from both books.