Gordon Crook was born in Richmond, England in 1921. After serving in World War II, he studied art in London and graduated with a degree in textile design. For the next twenty-two years he worked as a designer and teacher, during which time he was exposed to the Pop Art movement which had a major influence on his artwork.

Crook immigrated to New Zealand and in 1979 was commissioned to create twenty large banners for the New Zealand Embassy in Washington. The banners reflect Crook’s interpretation of imagery from the South Pacific. He also created works for several other New Zealand embassies such as Tonga, Samoa and Mexico.

Between 1981 and 1983, Crook designed colourful banners for the newly built Michael Fowler Centre, under the theme ‘Definitely Wellington’. These 22 massive textile works have become icons of Wellington’s artistic culture and heritage, and have helped ignite interest and appreciation of textiles as an art form.

In 1993 the City Gallery presented a major retrospective of Crook’s work, representing a wide range of media such as: book art, collage, drawing, painting, paper casts, photomontage, printmaking and tapestry.

A documentary about Crook’s life and work was premiered at the 2010 International Film Festival in Wellington. Directed by Claire O’Leary, the film documented the life of the ‘the frank and charmingly idiosyncratic Crook,’ and definitively relocated the artist within the canons of great New Zealand artists.

This embossed screenprint was donated directly from the artist with the instruction that it must be displayed in the Wellington City Public Library.