In a week that marks the 75th anniversary of the formal end to the Second World War in Japan, on 2 September 1945, it seems appropriate to pay tribute to the role played by artists during times of conflict. Raymond Spurrier reviewed the book by Meirion and Susan Harries entitled The War Artists that was published in association with the Imperial War Museum and the Tate Gallery in 1983. He remarked that this is how history should be written and added that ‘it paints a detailed and fascinating picture of the political and administrative background to the commissioning of war art.’
In 1916 the appointment of the first official war artist, Muirhead Bone, was driven by the need for more effective propaganda at the time. In addition to the military engagements of the First World War there was another intense battle against the Germans to win the support of neutral countries, not least the USA, and also to engage the people at home as civilian morale and public opinion became crucial. Pictorial propaganda began to play an increasingly important part but as the supply of suitable photographs was difficult to sustain the decision was made to use artists to fulfil this need. This led to an illustrious roll call that followed on from Bone and included Christopher Nevinson, Eric Kennington and Paul Nash during the First World War. At the end of this war the Imperial War Museum (IWM) took charge of the pictures that had been acquired during the scheme and the official British war art collection was unveiled at the Royal Academy at Christmas in 1919.
At the beginning of the Second World War the War Artists’ Advisory Committee (WAAC) was set up under the direction of Kenneth Clark whose intention was to produce a pictorial record of the war which was derived from his knowledge of the First World War schemes. The Committee’s terms of reference drawn up by the Ministry of Information were initially to provide a list of artists who were qualified to record the war at home and abroad. The first artist invited to the Committee was Muirhead Bone who provided an obvious link to the earlier scheme as well as representing the IWM through his role as a Trustee. The Principal of the Royal College of Art and the Professor at the Slade were also co-opted to help advise on the selection of artists from the list. During this period notable artists employed included Paul Nash, one of few war artists who had also been used in the First World War scheme, Henry Moore, Graham Sutherland, John Piper, Thomas Hennell, Stanley Spencer, Eric Ravilious, Carel Weight, Leslie Cole, Leonard Rosoman, Anthony Gross, Edward Ardizzone and Edward Bawden. In total around 6000 works were accumulated by the WAAC from over 300 artists.
In a feature article entitled ‘Images of War’ that was published in The Artist magazine in May 1983, Raymond recalls war art from the perspective of one who lived through the conflict of the Second World War in which several artists lost their lives. Eric Ravilious was a distinguished war artist who at the age of thirty-nine met a premature death in a plane that went missing over Iceland while he was attached to the Royal Marines. His replacement Thomas Hennell was also lost later in the war and Albert Richards was killed in a minefield on another assignment.
The first exhibition of official war art from the Second World War opened at the National Gallery on 3 July 1940 and was followed by a frequently changing display of war pictures. As at the end of the First World War, a large exhibition of war art was shown at the Royal Academy in the autumn of 1945 before later dispersal of the collection to galleries and museums throughout Britain and abroad. Today, the Imperial War Museum and the Tate are the primary custodians of this extraordinary collection of work.