Ted Hughes and Reg Lloyd | "That Moment", 10 numbered proof sheets, signed by the poet and the artist

Property of Frieda Hughes

Ted Hughes and Reg Lloyd

"That Moment"—Ted Hughes's Crow poem set out by Reg Lloyd, 1970

SIGNED BY TED HUGHES AND REG LLOYD, 10 numbered proof sheets, numbers 2/15 to 11/15, each 310 x 450mm., two sheets with small closed tear at outer margin, one sheet with minor crease at margin

Ted Hughes experimented with a number of ways of publishing his poetry, collaborating with numerous artists and publishers in the process. Whilst Hughes' collaboration with Leonard Baskin is well-known (see lots 350-357 and 369), his creative partnership with Reg Lloyd "is less well known [...] despite having been an ongoing commitment between 1970 and 1994" (Gifford, Ted Hughes in Context, 2018).

Hughes and Lloyd met in the mid-1960s, and these proof sheets date from their first creative collaboration in 1970, when Hughes gave Lloyd four poems to work from: "That Moment" (the present lot), "King of the Carrion", "Crow's Last Stand", and "Crow and the Birds" (Skea, "A Creative Collaboration"). Lloyd recalled of the artistic process that he:

"...printed the text on an old Hercules poster press using wooden typeface, then added the silkscreen decorations. These were produced in a very limited edition of twenty copies each, which were subsequently included in my exhibition of silkscreen prints and monotypes at the Irving Gallery, Bideford, in August 1970" (Lloyd, unpublished memoir).

The Irving Gallery exhibition catalogue hails Lloyd's prints, not as mere "illustrations of the poetry but, rather, extensions of the mood evoked by the words—a partnership of word and image". 

See also lot 366.

LITERATURE:

cf. Catalogue for "New Prints by R.J. Lloyd with poems by Ted Hughes and John Moat. 26 Aug.-12 Sept. 1970. At the Irving Gallery, 21 Bridgeland St., Bideford.", 4270; Sagar and Tabor, Ted Hughes: a bibliography, 1946-1995 (1998), A22