The author Walter Crane (August 15, 1845, in Liverpool; March 14, 1915, in Horsham, West Sussex) was an English painter and illustrator and one of the leading representatives of the Arts and Crafts Movement. In 1888, Crane played a crucial role in the founding of the "Art and Crafts Exhibition Society," of which he became the first president. The goal of the society was to revive art through craftsmanship and to draw attention to these "craftsmen." Other founding members of this society included William Morris, Edward Burne-Jones, Lewis F. Day, Heywood Sumner, Philip Webb, and Onslow Ford. As the rector of the Manchester School of Art from 1893 to 1896, he had mainly organized exhibitions at the Salon de Paris since 1878 and received several awards between 1898 and 1900, including a prize at an exhibition in the Brussels Salon in 1891. Crane was active from 1897 to 1898.