Harry Clarke

Clarke briefly moved to London to seek work as a book illustrator. Picked up by London publisher Harrap,[3] he started with two commissions which were never completed: Samuel Taylor Coleridge's The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (much of his work on which was destroyed during the 1916 Easter Rising) and an illustrated edition of Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock.[4]

Difficulties with these projects made Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen his first printed work, in 1916. It included 16 colour plates and more than 24 halftone illustrations. This was followed by an illustrations for an edition of Edgar Allan Poe's Tales of Mystery and Imagination: the first version of that title was restricted to halftone illustrations, while a second with eight colour plates and more than 24 halftone images was published in 1923.[4]

This 1923 edition made his reputation as a book illustrator, during the golden age of gift-book illustration in the first quarter of the twentieth century. It was followed by editions of The Years at the Spring, with 12 colour plates and more than 14 monotone images; (Lettice D'O. Walters, ed., 1920), Charles Perrault's Fairy Tales of Perrault, and Goethe's Faust, with eight colour plates and more than 70 halftone and duotone images (New York: Hartsdale House, 1925). The last of these is his most famous work, prefiguring the imagery of 1960s psychedelia.[4] Two of his most sought-after titles are promotional booklets for Jameson Irish Whiskey: A History of a Great House (1924, and subsequent reprints) and Elixir of Life (1925), which was written by Geofrey Warren. His final book, Selected Poems of Algernon Charles Swinburne, was published in 1928.[1]

Geneva Window, 1930

Clarke produced more than 130 windows, he and his brother Walter having taken over his father's studio after his death in 1921.[1] His glass is distinguished by the finesse of its drawing and his use of rich colours, and an innovative integration of the window leading as part of the overall design, originally inspired by an early visit to see the stained glass of the Cathedral of Chartres. He was especially fond of deep blues. Clarke's use of heavy lines in his black-and-white book illustrations echoes his glass techniques.[4]

Clarke's stained glass work includes many religious windows, but also much secular stained glass. Highlights of the former include the windows of the Honan Chapel in University College Cork; of the latter, a window illustrating John Keats' The Eve of St. Agnes (now in the Hugh Lane Municipal Gallery in Dublin) and the Geneva Window, created for the Centre William Rappard in Geneva, Switzerland (now in the Wolfsonian Museum, Miami, Florida, USA).[4] Perhaps his most seen works were the windows he made for Bewley's Café on Dublin's Grafton Street.[1]

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  Saint Gobnait, Honan Chapel, Cork, 1916
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  Chapel of the Sacred Heart, Dingle, The Baptism of Jesus, 1922–24
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  "Vision of Bernadette at Lourdes", Church of Saint John the Baptist, Duhill, County Tipperary

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  Queens whose finger once did stir men ("The Playboy of the Western World"), 1917
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  Illustration for Edgar Allan Poe's "Ligeia", 1923
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  The Fairy, from Fairy tales of Charles Perrault, 1922
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  The Colloquy of Monos and Una, Edgar Allan Poe series, 1923
• 
  Faust, page 2, 1925

• Poe, E. A. - Tales of Mystery and Imagination, George Harrap, London, 1919
• Walters, L. - The Year's at the Spring, George Harrap, London, 1920
• Perrault, C. - The Fairy Tales of Charles Perrault, George Harrap, London, 1922
• _____ Jameson The Origin of John Jameson Whiskey, Jameson 1924
• ____ The Elixir of Life Jameson 1925
• Goethe, J. W. von - Faust, George Harrap, London, 1925
• Swinburne, A. C. - Selected Poems of Charles Swinburne, John Lane, London, 1928