Edmund Evans was an English wood-engraver and colour printer during the Victorian era. He specialized in full-colour printing, a technique which, in part because of his work, became popular in the mid-19th century. He employed and collaborated with illustrators such as Walter Crane, Randolph Caldecott, Kate Greenaway and Richard Doyle to produce what are now considered to be classic children's books. Little is known about his life, although he wrote a short autobiography before his death in 1905 in which he described his life as a printer in Victorian London.
Illustration from "The House that Jack Built" in The Complete Collection of Pictures & Songs; engraving and printing by Edmund Evans, illustration by Randolph Caldecott (1887)
This 1853 title page for the Illustrated London Almanac is an example of Evans' engraving work. The illustration is designed by Myles Birket Foster.
"Death of the Kingmaker" from Chronicle of England, colour wood-engraving by Evans, illustration by James Doyle (1864). Evans used as many as ten colour blocks for the 80 prints in the volume.
In Fairyland, a Series of Pictures from the Elf-World engraving, illustrated by Richard Doyle, coloured and printed in 1870 by Evans.
Walter Crane was an English artist and book illustrator. He is considered to be the most influential, and among the most prolific, children's book creators of his generation and, along with Randolph Caldecott and Kate Greenaway, one of the strongest contributors to the child's nursery motif that the genre of English children's illustrated literature would exhibit in its developmental stages in the later 19th century.
Walter Crane, c. 1886
Portrait of young Walter Crane painted by his father
"A Garland for May Day 1895" woodcut
Crane's interest in Japanese art is evident in this 1874 cover of a toy book, printed by Edmund Evans.