Alfred Waldron

Alfred Waldron was a member of an artists’ colony on the little island of Sark, in the Channel Islands. Founded in the early 1930’s, the colony’s most famous member was the author and artist Mervyn Peake. Mervyn Peake had moved to Sark in 1932 and in 1933 Peake’s former English teacher, Eric Drake, was instrumental in the construction of a new art gallery on the island which was also used as a social centre. It was around this centre that Sark’s artist colony was formed and it was here that in 1934 Alfred Waldron was to exhibit his original linocuts.

“When he arrived, he said, ‘Call me Pip’, and everyone did. His particular gift was lino-cuts: ‘The perfect balance of the black and white, the vitality of the figures, the texture, and the composition as a whole, is amazing,’ wrote a critic after one of the exhibitions (Guernsey Star, 22 May 1934). For Eric Drake, ‘he seemed to live in a world of fantasy that was private to him, if not completely autistic. I think we all felt his innate ability, but we also knew of his traumatic childhood; I hoped Sark would snap him out of it, but I guess it needed more than that’ (Letter to G.P. Winnington dated 19 September 1977)…. Pip brought with him Alex Gannon to the Colony – ‘the two were hand in glove; I never tried to probe the relationship’, writes Eric Drake. ‘Once Pip had seen Sark, he could hardly be made to go back to Birmingham, yet Gannon could hardly be made to give up his business [also in Birmingham] and kick his heels in Sark.” (G. Peter Winnington Mervyn Peake's Vast Alchemies, revised and enlarged edition, published by Peter Owen, London, 2009). [more]