The Blazon of the Accompanying Armorial Achievement, from the series, Examples of Illumination and Heraldry, Federal Public Works of Art Project, Region #16, Washington State
1934 or 1935
Theodora Harrison
born Ireland, 1890; died Dublin, 1969. Active in Seattle, Washington, 1929-1951
These exquisite illuminations are replicas of famous illuminated manuscript all created by Seattle artist Theodora Lawrenson Harrison, who was internationally renowned as both a scholar of medieval manuscript illumination and a master illuminator herself. The Irish-born Harrison was an eminent figure in Northwest Art, a president of Women Painters of Washington, and a founder of the art gallery at Frederick and Nelson department store. But she was also internationally renowned as an illuminator and creator of armorial design. Commissions came from such high places as the royal offices of Britain’s King George VI. Harrison was commissioned to create the Seattle Art Museum coat of arms in 1934.
These were presented to SAM by the Federal Public Works of Art Project in 1934 or 1935. Subsidizing Harrison’s study and documentation of medieval manuscript illumination is the kind of work that the P.W.A.P. particularly valued—this effort is akin to the studies of artistic traditions that other renderers recorded for posterity as part of the P.W.A.P.’s monumental Index of American Design.
Ink and graphite on illustration board
Sheet size: 17 x 20in.
Mount: 20 5/8 x 23 ½ in.
Federal Public Works of Art Project, Region #16, Washington State
2013.6.2
Provenance: Presented by Federal Public Works of Art Project, Region #16, Washington State, 1934 or 1935
Photo: Elizabeth Mann
