The art was always of some facet of life around the artist. Although drawn symbolically, a description or characters and memories are available for them all. A very personal art is now for your viewing. An angel battling with a daemon was often symbolic of a marriage self destructing or of a soul looking for the light, or maybe just a cat fight at a nameless blues bar. Seeking grace was a common theme. All the drawings were aimed at later engravings. The thought was on multiple prints and water colouring them to make many individual copies of one picture available, so many people could have the image. There are many artist favorites in the collection. His printer once said to him, "Ignore The Canada Council [for the Arts] and their lack of recognition of you as a Canadian artist, just keep doing the work."

Doing just that and existing for 40 years, as a working artist is not easy, especially in a world of nasty, irrelevant, modernism running galleries. "There are many who can draw flowers but only one picture of the devil himself." says the unrepentant artist, still not bowing to commercial demand.

As one of very few artist-engravers in the world today doing these types of prints, Bruce Bradshaw stands alone. He is also one of the few master engravers of firearms in North America, and also a notably unrecognized Canadian artist. His limited edition books are in collections and libraries across North America.

The wood engraved prints were burnished off, in the studio by the artist, not pulled on a press. The editions were very low in number, due to excessive life demands, traditionally low artist wages, the cost of paper, children, wives and artistic needs. Copperplate editions as well were very, very low but necessarily printed on intaglio hand press. As a result, all the prints are rare and worth more. Compared to the mass of prints signed by commercial, gallery sponsored artists; these are in a very different league, definitely not of the same nature as the 5,000 of a Bateman offset edition.

An obsession with women, mysterious characters and the mystical life has inspired many pictures. Today, the focus is still in the time consuming task of making copperplates, with more women, new projects and even some past pictures finally being realized. Still not part of the commercial scene, and happily living in the country with his lovely muse, the work goes on in the studio. The art is now offered in this collection for all to see, savour and purchase. A happy ending, as they say, and proudly with an artistic vision that was never compromised.

From April to June 2009, A. B. Bradshaw successfully showed his art, along with 14 other artists, at the Galerie des artistes du Canton, in Magog, Quebec. Read all the details (French article).