[From the Community Collection, a public trust in Agincourt, Iowa]

WOMRATH, Andrew Kay [1874-1953]

European Couple by Day*

ca1930

woodcut / 8 inches by  6.25 inches / #6 from an edition of 25

Philadelphia artist Andrew Kay Womrath was born on St Crispin’s Day in 1874. He studied and collaborated with Japanese woodcut master Yoshijiro Urushibara but is little known in the United States today. Indeed there is a good deal of conflicting biographical material, including erroneous birth and death dates.

Womrath lived most of his productive life in France, but travelled frequently between there and the United States, England and Italy. Small landscapes are more typical of his output, as are Art Nouveau posters in the style of Theophile Steinlen. During 1914, he offered a class in “Decorative Design and Decorative Composition” at his studio in New York City — which indicates that considerable research needs to be done on this artist.

* There is also a nighttime version of this print.