A talk with a Pavement Artist

First-hand accounts about Victorian pavement artists are very rare indeed, so when I came across this story, I just had to share it. Published in The Quiver monthly magazine, 1898, this feature includes an interview, plus rare printed photographic examples of naïve, untutored, Victorian pavement art. The artist himself is unfortunately, unnamed.

“All the work o’ my own ‘and, sir.”

He was a little, clean-shaven man, dressed in brown clothes, of faded and woe-begone appearance, and a hat which had an air of drooping melancholy about it. He had chosen his position outside some empty shops, whose grimy shutters and closed doors seemed to scowl upon his pictures with asperity and disapproval. As I came down the roadway he was sitting on the pavement with his back against one of the door-posts, gazing across the street in a dejected and disconsolate way. But when he saw me pause and look at his pictures he started to his feet, took off his melancholy hat, and said:

“All the work o’ my own ‘and, sir.”

I nodded, and continued my inspection of his drawings.

He was a facetious artist in his way. There was, to begin with, a representation of a scraggy looking horse, with, underneath, the legend, written in scrawling characters “Oats wanted. Apply within.”

Secondly, there was a creature which I judged to be a mouse, in a prowling and expectant attitude. This was labelled “Hard Times.”

Thirdly, came a portrait of Mr Gladstone. The name was underneath, so I knew at once who it was.

He was also a poetical artist, for within another square was written this couplet:

“May the Rose of Old England never be blighted.

And a poor man’s talent never be slighted.”

Among the other efforts was a portrait of the artist himself, with very bulky cheeks and an intense rigidity of eye.

“You have drawn yourself too fat,” I said, looking at him critically.

He gazed at me with a somewhat uncertain air. Then he glanced at the picture in question. Then he shifted from one foot to the other, and looked sheepish. Finally, he smiled in a half-tolerant, half-crestfallen way, and, eyeing the picture again, said:

“Well p’r’aps I ‘ave—a bit. I must take ‘em in a little.”

“Take what in? Oh, you mean the cheeks! Yes, I should certainly take them in a little. I see you are chiefly a black-and-white artist,” I said.

He looked at me again, as who should say: “Are you making fun of me, or what?” Then he nodded his head in a vague and off-hand kind of way.

“You make a living at this?” I asked.

“Well, a sort of livin’,” he replied; “some days I takes a shillin’, other days I takes two. Other days p’r’aps I does scarcely anything.” It was beginning to rain a fine drizzling rain, and a murky greyness was stealing up the street. Already the pavement was becoming discoloured.

“Won’t this spoil the pictures?” I asked. “Well, it won’t wash ‘em out,” he answered; “but “—he jerked his thumb over his shoulder “it’ll keep the people indoors, an’ that’s wery bad for me—wery bad.”

“How long have you done this kind of thing?” I queried.

“Five years, or more,” he replied. “You see, I was a carpenter, an’ I got my ‘and smashed—there it is, sir: you can see for yerself. Well, I couldn’t ‘andle tools after that, an’ so I took to this. One must try to get an honest livin’ somehow.”

“And so you went in for Art. But who taught you to draw?”

“Picked it up myself,” he replied: “see’d others a-doin’ it, and got at it that way.”

“But there must be days when you can’t do pavement work—wet days, for instance, and snowy days?”

“Well, then I ‘as to go into the work’us,” he said blankly.

“But when the weather favours you, you manage to make a living at it?”

“Yes, sir,” he replied, brightening up again; “but,” he added, “I can only afford to live at the Salvation Army shelter.”

“How many subjects have you as your stock-in-trade?”

He looked important. “Well,” he said, pondering; “of course, I’ve got a good number now. I couldn’t tell you exactly ‘ow many. But what I’m fond of is Public Men. Now there’s Mr Gladstone; ‘e’s there now—“

“Yes,” I said; “I see him—you’ve got the name written underneath.”

“Well, I’m wery fond o’ doin’ ‘im. Many people didn’t agree with ‘im, but at any rate ‘e was a wery good man, an’ I air wery fond o’ doin’ ‘im. Then I does Lord Salisbury an’ Mr Balfour. I’m wery fond indeed o’ doin’ Public Men.”

“Wouldn’t it save you a great deal of trouble,” I asked, “if you made your drawings on boards, and brought them out with you, so that you wouldn’t have to do them afresh each time? I saw a man with boards yesterday, not far away from here.” It was in my innocence I said this, and I was not prepared for the indignation with which he received my suggestion.

He grunted contemptuously.

“It ain’t their own work!” he said, with infinite disdain. “They can’t draw, not ‘alf of ‘em, as comes out with boards!”

The he grunted again, and sniffed, and looked up the street.

“Not their own work!” I exclaimed. He gazed at me half-pityingly.

“No, in course not. There’s a man as draws pictures on boards, and let’s ‘em out to others to show in the streets, jest as though they was their own work. They can’t draw, them men with boards—not ‘alf of ‘em!”

He grunted again. Evidently I had touched a very sore point.

“And there are men who make their living by letting these boards out to others?”

“I s’pose they do,” he answered shortly. I marvelled. Truly one half the world does not know how the other half lives!

“A man come to me yesterday, an’ told me ‘e could let me ‘ave some boards to show,” he said, with a disdainful smile; “but I ses to ‘im, ‘I’m wery much obliged to you,” ses I, ‘but I’d rather do my own drorin’ work with my own ‘ands,’ ses I.”

“And how much do these men charge for the boards?” I asked.

He waved his hand with a highly contemptuous air.

“I knows nothin’ about it,” he replied; “but from what I ‘ear, they ‘as to pay ‘alf-a-crown or so a day.”

He sniffed again, as much as to say, “This subject annoys me, and I would rather not talk upon it.” Yet I felt obliged to push it to the extent of one more question ere I desisted.

“What guarantee have these men that those who hire their pictures will not run away with them?”

“Well I s’pose they ‘as to pay somethin’ on advantage.”

“On what? Oh, I see. They have to pay a deposit.”

“I s’pose they ‘ave. But I knows nothin’ whatever about it. I don’t ‘ave nothin’ to do with ‘em. I prefers to do my drorin’ myself. ‘Honest work in the street,’ ses I. You see I’ve written it down there. ‘Honest work in the street.’ If a man goes out to be a artist, let ‘im do ‘is drorin’ ‘imself.  That’s what I ses. Thank ‘ee sir, kindly. I’m generally ‘ere when the weather is favourable. An’ I does it all with my own ‘and; but, bless you, them men with boards can’t draw—not ‘alf of ‘em!”

I left him in a state of virtuous and indignant exultation. As I looked back at him, he was pulling his faded coat-collar up about his throat, looking dismally meanwhile at the wet pavement.

Written by Harry Davies: Originally published in the September edition of THE QUIVER 1898

Researched and edited by Philip Battle

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