The Giant Cable, 1931
Linocut
Linocut printed from four blocks in light cobalt blue, Venetian red, viridian and Chinese blue on a buff oriental laid tissue paper. Signed, titled and numbered in pencil in the top left from the edition of 50 of which only numbers 1/50 - 30/50 were made.

Andrews, together with Cyril Power and Lill Tschudi were the core of an informal group that learnt the art of linocutting under Claude Flight at the Grosvenor school of Modern Art in London’s Pimlico district during the late 1920s and 1930s.

Andrews came to London from Bury St Edmunds with her friend and companion Cyril Power in the early 1920a. They shared a studio in Brook Green in Hammersmith and worked alongside each other for many years and on joint projects such as the commissions for London Transport in 1933 for poster designs using the alias Andrew-Power.

Andrews’ subjects mostly depicted the labours of man, from her religious themes of the Christ pulling the cross to five labourers pulling on a giant cable, two turning the cable wheel and a single figure winding the crank handle. The composition forms a near triangle of the lower half of the block leaving a white space against which the workmen are silhouetted, taut with energy, their faces featureless.
31.2 x 42.6 cm (12¼ x 16¾ inches)

Literature:
LLinocuts of the Machine Age, Stephen Coppel, published by Scolar Press in association with the National Gallery of Australia, 1995. Cat No SA17
POA