Eric Gill At Guildford Cathedral

[poliphilo]

Eric Gill was a paedophile- and all round sex maniac- who abused his daughters- but, also, arguably, the most significant British artist of the first half of the 20th century. There have been mutterings about removing his work from public display (much of it is in ecclesiastical buildings) but I don't think anyone has actually done so. Guildford cathedral- which we were wandering round this morning- owns his statue of St John the Baptist- and seems rather proud of it. In the wake of the revelations about Michael Jackson (and Kevin Spacey and others) there's been a lot of debate about whether one can separate an artist from their art; in the case of Gill the owners of his work seem to have decided that "Yes, of course they can. End of."