Painter of landscapes, portraits, still-life, animals, imaginative subjects and inscriptions in watercolours; draughtsman, engraver, writer and poet.

He studied at Camberwell School of Art 1909-1914, under Hartrick who influenced his use of pencil, watercolour and bodycolour, and Savage who introduced him to the work of the Pre-Raphaelites and the English illustrators. From 1915-1918 he served with the Royal Welch Fusiliers and in 1919-21 attended Westminster School of Art under Bayes and Meninsky where he was influenced by Blake and El Greco.

In 1921 he was received into the Catholic Church and he made his first visit to Eric Gill in Ditchling. He subsequently moved to Ditchling, becoming a member of the Third Order of St.Joseph and St.Dominic and learning wood engraving from Desmond Chute.

In 1924 he moved to North Wales with Gill and in 1925 painted at Caldy Island. He was elected to the Society of Wood Engravers in 1927 and in 1929 he worked at Rock Hall, Northumberland, the home of Helen Sutherland, but a breakdown in 1932 prevented him from painting until 1936. A period working in London was followed by another breakdown in 1946-7.

He first exhibited with Eric Gill at St.George’s Gallery in 1927, subsequently showing with the 7 & 5 Society from 1928 to 1933, at the Goupil Gallery in 1929 and at leading London galleries, His work was exhibited at the Venice Biennale in 1951, and at the Tate Gallery 1954-5 and 1981. He is represented in many public collections including the Tate Gallery and he was created CBE in 1955 and CH in 1974. His wood engravings, influenced by Gill, include illustrations for The Chester Play of the Deluge, 1927, and other publications for the Golden Cockerel Press, whilst his own writings include In Parenthesis, 1937, for which he was awarded the Hawthornden Prize, and The Anathemata, 1952. His art is essentially religious, expressing the spiritual character of landscape and figures. He evolved an idiosyncratic, elegant and complex visual language using areas of transparent watercolour and many fine lines to build up a wealth of detail and allusion. In his intricate subject pictures he wove together mythological and Christian iconography in order to express his spiritual vision.