The Scottish poet-publisher and visual artist Ian Hamilton Finlay (1925-2006) was a figurehead of concrete and visual poetry.

In 1958 the visual and poetic autodidact founded The Wild Hawthorn Press, which focused on the publication of the graphic work of Finlay: prints, cards and booklets.

In addition to nature, traditional renderings of the landscape, the sea and shipping, his work evinces (ironic) references to 'critical' periods such as the Enlightenment, the French Revolution, the historical avant-garde and the Second World War.