A Report On William Morris – Designer, Poet, Novelist, Translator, And Socialist Activist

William Morris was a British textile designer, poet, novelist, translator, and socialist activist associated with the British Arts and Crafts Movement. He was a major contributor to the revival of traditional British textile arts and methods of production. Most of his art was of nature such as his famous wallpaper, “Seaweed”. His art work had many influences on it, which helped him to create most of his astounding art pieces. 

Morris was born in Walthamstow, Essex in 1834, his family was wealthy and middle-class. He went to Marlborough College where he was learning to be an architect, where he briefly worked as an architect and later went on to explore art. Then, he married Jane Burden, after he developed close relations with the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. In 1891, he opened an art firm with many other artist and began creating artwork that was much in demand at the time. Sadly, in 1896, he died but was survived by his wife and two daughters. 

There were many influences on his artwork, such as the “Seaweed” wallpaper piece, his main influence was the Industrial revolution. The industrial revolution cause many craftsman to lose business, since many objects were being mass produce, so Morris felt this made household goods look more soulless and dull, he strived “to revive a sense of beauty in the homelife, to restore the dignity of art to the ordinary household decoration” this desire helped influence many of his art pieces. Even nature helped influence his art, all of his pieces have some sort of nature in them, he even learned about half of an encyclopedia worth of nature terms. 

My favorite piece of art he did is called “Strawberry Thief”, it shows a blue bird at the top and bottom of the wallpaper picking strawberries from a vine and then in the middle ground it shows a red bird reaching to take strawberries. The process of creating this piece started in 1875 but didn’t get finished until around 1883. To make this piece he used a indigo-discharge method, which was his favorite form printing. This piece is one of William Morris’s more famous pieces of art. 

William Morris was an artist that was influenced by nature and the industrial revolution, He made many pieces of art that incorporated his fascination with nature, such as his artwork titled “Seaweed” or “Strawberry Thief”. His nature inspirations ranged from flowers to animals to vegetables. Most of his work is very famous and unique, his name is known by many, his work and memory will live for a very long time.