As winner of the Rome Scholarship for engraving in 1922, Austin became one of the leading exponents of the reintroduction of original line engraving to England during the mid-to-late 1920s. A reviewer of his one-man show in 1925 exclaimed that he would be remembered as 'one of the best etchers alive', working in the 'clean-cut, sure-and-certain manner of Durer, with whose wonderful draughtsmanship and sense of line his own work has much in common' (Leicester Chronicle, 5 Dec 1925, p 2)

Trained under the expert guidance of Sir Frank Short, Austin made this preparatory drawing as a student at the Royal College of Art, where he eventually became Professor of Engraving.