Letters from Planet issue 250

Letter from Ceri Thomas

Dear Editor,

Norena Shopland, in her review of Ogwyn Davies: Bywyd a Gwaith / A Life in Art (Planet 249), concludes:

Sadly [Davies’s] death brought little acknowledgement, particularly in the English-language press, so, despite the rather stilted English version of the text, it is hoped this bilingual book will raise awareness of a remarkable artist.

The book’s Welsh-language translator Arwel Vittle has stated:

I hope the book and the artist get the attention they deserve when published … it really is a title to be proud of. I’m so glad that Y Lolfa asked me to play my small part in producing such a handsome volume, and I think it must rank as the most fulfilling and worthwhile translation project I’ve been involved with.

And Jon Gower writes in his review for Nation.Cymru (12 March 2023):

This book by the artist and critic Ceri Thomas, who has done so much to explain and explore Welsh art, offers a brisk introduction to the artist’s life and to the various phases of Davies’ creative development. … Ceri Thomas deftly uses Alfred Zimmern’s three-Wales model to suggest that Davies’ early upbringing in industrial south Wales was in an integral part of what Zimmern called ‘American Wales’, as opposed to upper class or English Wales and what he referred to as ‘Welsh Wales’. … Thomas encapsulates the ways in which Ogwyn Davies synthesised ‘the traditional and the modern, the Welsh and the internationalist’, noting the ‘pioneering, almost alchemical process of his’ which began in the Sixties and continued into the 21st century.

Ceri Thomas

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Letters From Planet 250