Nora Spicer Unwin (1907-1982) was British wood engraver and illustrator who moved to Peterborough after World War II. Shortly before her death, she gave the contents of her studio to the Sharon Arts Center in nearby Sharon, NH with the hope the collection would serve as a tool for instruction and inspiration for artists in the future. Sharon Arts Center carefully stewarded the collection in the decades to follow. Later, Sharon Arts Center merged with the New Hampshire Institute of Art (NHIA). In 2018, New England College acquired NHIA and shortly after closed the Sharon Arts Center school and gallery. In 2022, New England College gave the collection to the Monadnock Center for History and Culture.
Born in Surbiton, England in 1907, Nora Unwin knew from a young age that she wanted to be an artist. She had the great fortune to be born into the Unwin family who were for more than a century among the most important printers and publishers in England. When Nora was just 18 years old, her uncle commissioned her to design the cover of a book while she was still in art school. While a student, The British Museum acquired two of her wood engravings for their permanent collection. After finishing her training, Unwin pursued wood engraving, illustration and teaching for the rest of her life.
Unwin’s twin sister Nancy introduced her to a young American couple living in London in the 1930s. William McGreal was a businessman and his wife was the writer Elizabeth Yates. Yates and Unwin quickly began collaborating on their first publication, a partnership that would last until Unwin’s death in 1982. In 1939, the looming war with Germany forced Yates and McGreal to return to the U.S. where they settled in Peterborough, NH. After the war, Nora Unwin came to the states for an extended visit with Elizabeth and Bill but she soon realized she had found a new home.
Over her career, Unwin illustrated over 100 books and wrote and illustrated twelve books of her own. The Nora S. Unwin Collection at the Monadnock Center contains over 1,600 individual works and spans the entirety of her artistic career from early drawings made as a child to her experiments in abstraction in her later life. The collection includes wood engravings, woodblocks, drawings, sketchbooks, watercolors, paintings, collages, and collagraphs.
Selections from the Nora S. Unwin Collection
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| Untitled Watercolor, 1921 Nora Unwin made this watercolor of a whimsical fairy when she was 14 years old. | Field Voles, Wood Engraving, 1933 Minutely observed studies of nature like Field Voles is a hallmark of Unwin’s work. | Coast of North Wales, Watercolor, 1944 |
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| Field Glasses, Wood Engraving, 1947 This engraving is one of dozens Unwin made for John Kieran’s Footnotes on Nature published in 1947. | Jack-in-the-Pulpits, Wood Engraving, 1954 Among Unwin’s best known engravings, Jack-in-the-Pulpits demonstrates Unwin’s complete mastery of wood engraving and design. | Mexican Women, Wood Engraving, 1956 With Mexican Women and other works in the 1950s, Unwin began to break away from the highly naturalistic style that characterized her earlier work. |
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| Morning Stillness, Wood Engraving, 1976 Morning Stillness represents Mt. Monadnock and Dublin Pond, familiar landmarks to residents of Peterborough and the Monadnock Region. | Chickadees, Wood Engraving, 1977 Unwin’s final wood engraving was made for the cover of her last book, The Chickadees Come and Other Poems. The dedication reads simply, “For Elizabeth.” |