Nicola Gordon Bowe examines a rare collection of Harry Clarke’s first published illustrations for Hans Christian Andersen’s Fairy Tales
Many of Harry Clarke’s original pen and ink drawings and watercolours for the five books he illustrated for the London publishers, George G Harrap, are believed to have perished when their offices in Holborn were destroyed in the Blitz. Those that have survived tend to have been either the unpublished versions, usually given by the artist to friends, colleagues and family, or those he retained and sold at exhibitions in Dublin, Cork, London or New York during his short lifetime (1889–1931)
