Apprenticeship

I recently had the pleasure of being in Italy at Spineto Abbey where the letter-cutter Lida Kindersley was awarded one of the annual human ecology prizes for her work. My uncle Hew Lorimer was a sculptor and letter-cutter, who, like Lida's late husband David, was apprenticed to Eric Gill in the 1930s. The short film about letter cutting made a great impression on me, as has this book on apprenticeships, subtitled 'the necessity of learning by doing,' and with a foreword by the Prince of Wales. The three short chapters provide a brief history of apprenticeship, the experience of David Kindersley and then that of Lida with David. The essential point is that this knowledge is handed down within a community, as was painting in the 17th century, where many great masterpieces emerged from workshops without necessarily being signed by the master himself. Only by doing can one achieve a feel for the art and this must be done slowly, with absolute concentration, preferably in an atmosphere of timelessness. Perfecting technique is itself a slow process and the responsibility for a collective work his enormous - everyone has to do their best if a team is engaged in cutting letters. This book on apprenticeship is also a philosophy of life.