Gunvor and Peter Edwards



Gunvor and Peter Edwards are two impressionistic artists who illustrated the Railway Series from 1963 to 1972.

Artist for Hire
After John T. Kenney resigned from the Railway Series due to failing eyesight, editor Eric Marriot decided to ask Swedish-born artist Gunvor Edwards to see whether she would try her hand at some illustrations for the latest book, Stepney the "Bluebell" Engine. Gunvor accepted the commission and decided to start well into the book with the illustration of the Diesel standing alongside the other engines in their shed.

However, Gunvor had difficulty with the small space she was required to work with (about ten by six inches) and soon realized that duplicating the work of previous illustrators was not going to be easy. So she turned to her husband, Peter, who was, as he put it, "trying to be a 'serious' artist". And although he was no more able to imitate earlier work in the Railway Series any better than his wife, both Marriot and the Reverend W. Awdry were satisfied with his pictures. Although Edwards' style was more impressionistic than that of any previous Railway Series artist, Wilbert liked his work because he drew from life and "obviously had an affection for the characters".

Inspiration
Edwards often went on location to sketch real locomotives and landscapes to get inspiration for illustrations. "At a time in our life," said Edwards, "of short funds and few breaks, the family had an excuse to explore the Welsh Coast, Lakeland, Cornwall and Devon, Sussex and Kent with a steam trip to cap it all!" This kind of dedication impressed the author; as he recalled, "Peter was so keen on getting authentic drawings of the locomotives that he went down to Llanberis in January to visit workshops of the Snowdon Mountain Railway."

Working life
Edwards continued as illustrator up until 1972 with the publication of the final book, Tramway Engines. He even illustrated the "Surprise Packet" in 1971 at a time when Awdry had writer's block. It it thought that his illustrations were of some inspiration to Edgar Hodges in his illustrations of the 1979 and 1980 annuals.

Books illustrated

 * Stepney the "Bluebell" Engine
 * Mountain Engines
 * Very Old Engines
 * Main Line Engines
 * Small Railway Engines
 * Enterprising Engines
 * Oliver the Western Engine
 * Duke the Lost Engine
 * Tramway Engines

Trivia

 * In late Summer 2007, SiF's "Troublesome Truck", on behalf of SiF, was honoured to have received a reply from Peter Edwards.
 * Despite being the main artist of Stepney the "Bluebell" Engine and the sole artist for all further books, he shared joint credit with his wife for all of them.