An early version of Methods of Construction (5)

Drawing spirals can be surprisingly complex. In this drawing Bain explores how to create them in one, two, three, four or five-parts. He then elaborates on the basic design, joining spirals together by using what he calls his ‘C-method’. These two designs are not repeated in any of Bain’s publications. But he does include llustrations of the C-method in other ways, based on an example from the Book of Kells.

George Bain’s passion was to bring together methods for drawing Celtic interlaced art that anyone could use. He clearly hoped to publish his work, the illustrations in this series beiing dated 1935. But it wasn’t until 1945 that his first booklets appeared.  One of them focussed on spirals, but it didn’t use this illustration. Nor did his 1952 book Celtic Art, Methods of Construction.