20. A Pervy Sculptor
The public image of Eric Gill (1882 – 1940) would have been destroyed, and he would have probably ended his life behind bars, if his true self had been known during his lifetime. Gill was a celebrated English sculptor, printmaker, and typeface designer, many of whose fonts are still in use today. He was named Royal Designer for Industry, Britain’s highest award for designers. He played a prominent role in the anti-industrial Arts and Crafts Movement that flourished in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which popularized the use of folk styles of decoration. He was also a total pervert.
Gill was a man of many contrasts, to say the least. In 1913, he converted to Catholicism, and as with many a newcomer to a faith, he became a zealot, loudly and ostentatiously professing devoutness to his new creed. With his wife and others, he founded a lay Catholic religious order called The Guild of Saint Joseph and Saint Dominic, and went around wearing habits, with a girdle of chastity beneath. The chastity girdle was probably more aspirational than anything else, because it did not stop Gill from being a creep.