Gawain Staunches the Wound to His Neck

Screenprint – unmounted, unframed

Image size: 550mm x 550mm

Paper size: 705mm x 690mm

Edition size: 75

From the series of fourteen prints by Clive Hicks-Jenkins, editioned by The Penfold Press, based on the medieval poem 'Sir Gawain and the Green Knight'.

Author and curator James Russell describes Clive's depiction of Gawain Staunches the Wound to His Neck:

"The Green Knight raises his axe to strike Gawain, but the knight shrinks from the blow. The second strike misses. The third nicks the flesh of his neck, and perceiving his salvation Gawain leaps away and demands that the Green Knight honour their bargain: a blow for a blow. The monstrous figure leans on his axe and, in a good-humoured tone, explains that Gawain has been secretly tested and that he has passed with flying colours. His only fault – which earned him the wound to his neck – lay in accepting the girdle from Bertilak’s wife and not revealing the gift to his host."