Text source: A Dictionary of Modern and Contemporary Art (Oxford University Press)
British graphic artist, theatre designer, painter, and writer, born in Cambridge, the daughter of Sir George Darwin, professor of astronomy, and granddaughter of Charles Darwin. She studied at the *Slade School, 1908–11, but was mainly self-taught in wood engraving, which was her primary activity. In 1911 she married Jacques Raverat, a French former student of mathematics at Cambridge who had taken up painting and studied with her at the Slade. They spent much of their time in France until his death in 1925; thereafter she lived in London and Cambridge. She was a founder of the Society of Wood Engravers in 1920 and was best known for her book illustrations, notably of collections of poems by her cousin Frances Cornford and for the Cambridge Book of Poetry for Children, selected by Kenneth Grahame (1932).
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Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
Biography on Oxford Art Online
Biography from Liss Llewellyn
Painter and wood engraver known as Gwen Raverat. She was the granddaughter of Sir Charles Darwin and studied at Slade School of Art, 1908-11. On leaving the Slade School she married French artist Jacques Raverat and with him, emigrated to Vence in the South of France in 1920 where they stayed until his death in 1925. Raverat was a founder member of the Society of Wood Engravers and was constantly in demand as an illustrator, although she continued to paint. She designed for the stage and she was also a regular art critic for Time and Tide, for more than a decade from 1928.
She exhibited at the RA, NEAC, Redfern Gallery, Zwemmer Gallery, RSA, RHA, RE and the Cambridge Drawing Society. In 1987 a comprehensive exhibition of her work was shown at the Manor Gallery, Royston, Hertfordshire. Examples of her wood engravings can be found in the New Hall College, Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum, Museums Sheffield, NRM, V&A and BM. The London dealers Abbott and Holder held a successful exhibition of her work at their gallery in Museum Street in 2004 and over 500 works by her are archived at the Cambridge based Broughton House Gallery.
With thanks to artbiogs.co.uk