Art Blog

01 Painting, The art of War, George Bellows' Edith Cavell, with footnotes

George Bellows (1882–1925)

Edith Cavell, c. 1918

Oil on canvas

height: 114.3 cm (45 in); width: 160 cm (63 in)

Springfield Museums

Edith Louisa Cavell (4 December 1865 – 12 October 1915) was a British nurse and member of La Dame Blanche. She is celebrated for treating wounded soldiers from both sides without discrimination and for covertly helping some 200 Allied soldiers escape from German-occupied Belgium and return to active service during the First World War, which in wartime was a death penalty offence under the German military law of the Second Reich. Cavell was arrested and court-martialed for that offence as an act of war-treason, found guilty, and sentenced to death by firing squad. Despite international pressure for mercy, the German Government ruled that Cavell knew that her acts were punishable; they thus refused to commute her sentence, and she was shot. Her execution, however, received worldwide condemnation and extensive global press coverage arranged by Wellington House.

The night before her execution, she said, "Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone." These words were later inscribed on a memorial to her near Trafalgar Square. Her strong Anglican beliefs propelled her to help all those who needed it, including both German and Allied soldiers. She was quoted as saying, "I can't stop while there are lives to be saved." The Church of England commemorates her in its Calendar of Saints on 12 October.

Cavell, who was 49 at the time of her execution, was already notable as a pioneer of modern nursing in Belgium. More on Edith Louisa Cavell

American painter and printmaker George Wesley Bellows played a crucial role in early 20th century American art. He depicted contemporary scenes of everyday life in urban environments through an overtly Realist approach, presenting the realities of tenement life on the Lower East Side, the bristly physicality of men working on the docks, or widely attended popular sporting events. His sudden death from appendicitis at the age of forty-two tragically cut short an impressive, singular career.

Born in Columbus, Ohio in 1882, Bellows sustained parallel interests in art and sports, drawing, painting and playing baseball and basketball regularly from a young age. After declining an offer from the Indianapolis baseball team to play professionally, Bellows attended Ohio State University and later moved to New York City to study under Robert Henri and pursue a career as a painter. Within five years, Bellows gained critical and commercial success, exhibiting alongside Ashcan School painters William Glackens and John Sloan and regularly contributing illustrations to popular magazines. His paintings and prints depicting a rough, grimy New York City that was full of life and vitality have become iconic artworks of the early twentieth century. Over time, his work became increasingly politically engaged, as he openly criticized atrocities committed by Germany during World War I, or the bureaucracy and censorship of the United States government.

The Boston Public Library holds a considerable selection of his prints, while many of his major paintings can be found at the Columbus Museum of Art, the Whitney Museum of Art, the National Gallery, the Museum of Modern Art and many other major institutions. More on George Wesley Bellows

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01 Painting, The art of War, André Fougeron's Massacre at Sakiet, with footnotes

André Fougeron 1913–1998

Massacre à Sakiet III

Oil paint on canvas

970 × 1950

Tate

Sakiet Sidi Youssef is a town and commune in the Kef Governorate, Tunisia, near the border with Algeria.

On 8 February 1958, it was bombarded by French forces in the belief that it was serving as a refuge for Algerian independence fighters. About 20 French bombers and fighters attacked causing at least 70 deaths and 130 wounded. This event sparked an international outcry and helped precipitate the end of the Algerian War. More on Sakiet

The crisis of French colonial policy became especially acute in the mid-1950s as indigenous peoples in North Africa fought for independence. In Algeria which was considered integral to France by the then government, there were acts of violence on all sides. The Communist Party actively supported the cause of colonised peoples and this is reflected in Fougeron's choice of subject matter for Massacre at Sakiet III. More on this painting

André Fougeron was a visual artist. André Fougeron was born in 1913 and died in 1998. Also born in 1913 and of this same generation are Michelangelo Conte, Alston Emerson Emery, Eugene Harris, Peter Paul Dubaniewicz, and Wim Burger.

Emerging as a major figure in the avant-garde movements that defined France's early 20th century cultural identity, Aragon's long career as a poet, novelist, communist polemicist and bona-fide war hero, secured him his place in the pantheon of French literary greats. With André Breton and Phillipe Soupault, Aragon launched the Surrealist movement and through his 1926 novel, Paysan de Paris (Paris Peasant), produced what is considered by most to be the movement's defining literary text. Having parted company with the movement in the early 1930s, Aragon devoted his energies to the French Communist Party and went on to produce a vast body of literature that combined elements of the avant-garde and social realism. Following the death of his beloved wife, Elsa Triolet, Aragon emerged as a public figure who positively flaunted his new identity as a dandyish homosexual around Paris. More on André Fougeron

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02 Paintings, The art of War, Leonard Henry Rosoman's House Collapsing on Two Firemen, with footnotes

Leonard Henry Rosoman (1913–2012)

A House Collapsing on Two Firemen, c. 1940

Oil on canvas

H 91.8 x W 76.8 cm

IWM (Imperial War Museums)

Dramatic view of a building on fire during the Second World War in Cheapside, London. The figure of fireman Leonard Rosoman and other auxiliary firemen are silhouetted on the ground in the brightness of the scene, as they fight the blaze; they target jets of water onto the flames of the burning building. More on this painting

Leonard Henry Rosoman (1913–2012)

Auxiliary Fireman Leonard Rosoman, Cheapside, c. 1940

Oil on canvas

H 56.2 x W 66.6 cm

Manchester Art Gallery

Leonard Henry Rosoman, 1913–2012, painter, was mural artist, illustrator and teacher. Born in London Rosoman basically remained there, although he travelled extensively. He studied, 1930–5, at King Edward VII School of Art, University of Durham, where his teachers included E M O’Rorke Dickey, then at Royal Academy Schools, 1935–6, and at Central School of Arts and Crafts, 1937–8, under Bernard Meninsky. Rosoman taught from 1938–9 at Reimann School, where his subject was perspective, but on outbreak of World War II he was mobilised into the National Fire Service. In 1943 he was seconded to the War Office to illustrate books on firefighting, being appointed an Official War Artist to the Admiralty in 1944. His depictions of firefighting were among his most outstanding early work.

Had first one-man show in 1946 at St George’s Gallery. In 1947–8 Rosoman taught at Camberwell School of Arts and Crafts; at Edinburgh College of Art, 1948–56; and at Royal College of Art, 1956–78. He exhibited in RA Summer Exhibition from 1960 and was elected RA, 1970. Showed extensively at Fine Art Society, which gave him a retrospective in 1974, a ninetieth-birthday exhibition in 2003. Rosoman carried out a number of important mural commissions, notably for Festival of Britain in 1951 and for Shakespeare Exhibition at Stratford-upon-Avon, 1964. Tate Gallery, Imperial War Museum and other public collections hold his work. More on Leonard Henry Rosoman

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01 Fresco, The art of War, Il trionfo della morte/ The Triumph of Death, circa 1446, with footnotes

Unknown master (Maestro del Trionfo della Morte)

Il trionfo della morte/ The Triumph of Death, circa 1446

Fresco

600 × 642 cm (19.6 × 21 ft)

Galleria Regionale della Sicilia (Palermo)

The fresco depicts a luxurious garden surrounded by a hedge. Death enters riding a skeletal horse, firing arrows from a bow. Death aims at characters belonging to all social levels, killing them. Death has just released an arrow, which has hit a young man in the lower right corner; Death also wears a scythe at the side of the saddle, its typical attribute.

On the lower part are corpses of the people previously killed. Each character is portrayed differently: some still have a grimace of pain on the face, while others are serene; some have their limbs dismembered on the ground, and others are kneeling after having been just struck by an arrow. On the left is a group of poor people, invoking Death to stop their suffering, but being ignored.

On the right, a group of richly dressed noblewomen and knights with fur clothes are entertained by a musician. They appear to have no interest in the events and continue to socialize.

The fresco was stripped and divided into four parts to be housed in the Regional Gallery, where it is now located. Though at the time of the removal the work was in good condition, gradually during the 20th century the painted surface has detached near the points of division, compromising the integrity of the scene. More on this Fresco

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01 Painting, The art of War, George Wesley Bellows' Barricade, with footnotes

George Wesley Bellows, American, 1882 - 1925

Detail; The Barricade

Oil on canvas

48 1/8 x 83 1/2 in. (122.2 x 212.1 cm)

Birmingham Museum of Art

George Wesley Bellows, American, 1882 - 1925

The Barricade

Oil on canvas

48 1/8 x 83 1/2 in. (122.2 x 212.1 cm)

Birmingham Museum of Art

In 1918, moved by reports of atrocities committed against civilians during the First World War, Bellows departed from his typical subjects and painted five large-scale canvases to call attention to their plight. The Barricade derives from an incident during the invasion of Belgium in August 1914, when German soldiers used townspeople as a human shield. Bellows presented the victims as nudes, simultaneously underscoring their vulnerability and recalling depictions of martyred saints from the history of art. Because Bellows had not witnessed these events firsthand, the artist Joseph Pennell charged that he had no right to paint them. Bellows replied that he was not aware that Leonardo da Vinci had “had a ticket to paint the Last Supper.” More on this painting

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01 Photograph, The art of War, Oliver Weiken's A young Palestinian girl, with footnotes

Oliver Weiken

A young Palestinian girl

photograph

Private collection

Jul. 24, 2014. A young Palestinian girl who got injured when a UN school for refugees was allegedly hit by a Israeli tank shells, lies on a hospital bed in the emergency room of Kamal Adwan hospital in Beit Lahiya, Gaza Strip.

Oliver Weiken has a diverse and extensive work experience in the field of photography. Oliver started his career as a Freelance Photographer for the local newspaper Soester Anzeiger in 1996. Oliver then worked as a Staff Photographer for Bongarts Sportfotografie GmbH from 2001 to 2003. During this time, he also had a brief period as a Freelance Photographer. From 2003 to 2005, Oliver worked as a Staff Photographer for Deutsche Presse-Agentur. Oliver then joined European Pressphoto Agency in 2005 and held various positions including Staff Photographer, International Roving Photographer, Senior Photographer, Chief Photographer Middle East & North Africa, and Senior Photographer again. In 2017, Oliver returned to Deutsche Presse-Agentur as the Head of International Picture Desk.

Oliver Weiken attended Friedrich Spee Gymnasium in Ruethen from 1994 to 2003. During this period, they obtained a German Abitur, which is the equivalent to a university entrance diploma. No specific field of study was mentioned.

In 2017, Weiken returned to DPA to build their English photo wire and serve as Chief Photographer for the Middle East and North Africa, from their Cairo office. Weiken is an Award-winning photographer 2020 Photo Contest. More on Oliver Weiken

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02 Works, The art of War, Andrew Wyeth and Birds of War, with footnotes

Andrew Wyeth (1917–2009)

Soaring, c. 1942-1950

Tempera on Masonite

48 x 87 inches

Shelburne Museum

In Soaring, begun in 1942, Wyeth took to the sky to adopt a bird’s-eye view of his surrounding landscape. In this large-scale painting, the viewer hovers with three turkey vultures above a lone house and barn isolated in a vast, empty landscape. The largest vulture, suspended just below the posited viewer, spreads its wings to span almost the entire width of the painting. It appears as a dark form outlined against the fallow winter fields below. The two other raptors that circle below, closing in on the farm, indicate the yawning distance between the viewer and the ground.

Wyeth implicitly presents this vision as avian and not human, exploring the divergence between the human and the animal much like Foster would later do. Although the viewer may adopt the vulture’s perspective in Soaring, able to discern the little white farmhouse embedded in the landscape below, she cannot see or smell the carrion that the circling birds obviously do. After all, the turkey buzzard feeds primarily on the dead flesh of animals owing to its keen senses of vision and smell that humans simply lack. More on this painting

Andrew Wyeth (1917–2009)

Thurkey Buzzard Soaring (verso), ca. 1942

Graphite pencil on paper

19⅜ x 29 inches

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Andrew Newell Wyeth (July 12, 1917 – January 16, 2009) was an American visual artist, primarily a realist painter, working predominantly in a regionalist style. He believed he was also an abstractionist, portraying subjects in a new, meaningful way. Raised with an appreciation of nature, Wyeth took walks that fired his imagination. Henry David Thoreau, Robert Frost, and King Vidor's The Big Parade (1925) inspired him intellectually and artistically.

His father, N. C., gave him art lessons as a child, during which he developed the skills to create landscapes, illustrations, works of figures, and watercolor paintings. His brother-in-law, Peter Hurd, taught him to use egg tempera.

In his art, Wyeth's favorite subjects were the land and people around him, both in his hometown of Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania and at his summer home in Cushing, Maine. He made a collection of about 300 paintings of windows which were presented in the National Gallery of Art's 2014 exhibition, "Andrew Wyeth: Looking Out, Looking In". In the 1960s, he began to paint portraits of family members, friends, and neighbors. Wyeth often said: "I paint my life."

Summarizing the variation of opinions about his work, art historian Robert Rosenblum said that Wyeth was the "most overrated and underrated" artist. He was known for his skill at creating watercolor and tempera paintings that engage one's senses and emotions. Christina's World became an iconic image, a status unmet by even the best paintings, "that registers as an emotional and cultural reference point in the minds of millions." Among the awards and honors that he received since 1947 are the Presidential Medal of Freedom and Congressional Gold Medals and he was elected to Britain's Royal Academy. More on Andrew Newell Wyeth

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01 Painting, The art of War, Horacio Ferrer's Madrid 1937 (Aviones negros), with footnotes

Horacio Ferrer, Cordoba, Spain, 1894 - Madrid, Spain, 1978

Madrid 1937 (Aviones negros) (Madrid 1937 Black Airplanes), c. 1937

Oil on canvas

148 x 129 cm

Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía

Ferrer had studied in Italy on a grant from the Junta de Ampliación de Estudios (Board of Advanced Studies). He spent one year there, between 1934 and 1935, studying, among other things, the fresco technique. It is also worth noting Ferrer’s early preferences and artistic knowledge; his library contained copies of French and German magazines involved in disseminating the fashionable trend in Europe from the 1920s onwards, the “return to order”. All of this was conducive to creations such as Madrid 1937 (Aviones negros), in which the obvious propagandistic intent of emphasizing the distressing situation in wartime Spain is not diminished by the excellence of the pictorial outcome. The dramatic scene, which calls to mind the effects of the fresco technique, also emulates the content of Picasso’s own Guernica. Indeed, although presented from a different stylistic perspective, here too the women flee in terror, their children in their arms, crying out against the bombings that have ruined their lives and displaying their utter scorn for the barbarity of war. More on this painting

A group of fleeing women and children of different ages are set within an almost square frame, closed cropped for maximum drama and power set against a grey backdrop of destruction and rubble. We feel a part of the commotion, emotions, panic and horror.

A woman (bottom left) holds up a protecting hand with a look of shock. She grasps the hands of a small boy, crying, terrified and throwing up his hand, reacting to an out of frame commotion. Behind is a woman clutching a baby in swaddling cloths, her look of horror suggesting the baby may already be dead.

The central main figure hold a young child, she looks to the sky shaking her fist at the bombing aeroplanes raining death and destruction or shaking a fist of anger towards God itself. A breast is bared, another defiant gesture, a universal symbol of vulnerability, the nurturing, life-giving qualities upholding the primal principles of humanity. Behind stands an older woman in shadow, almost a ghost, hands clasped as if praying, resigned to her own fate, pleading for the preservation of the younger mothers and children. Paul Woods More on this painting

Horacio Ferrer (Cordoba, 1894 - Madrid, 1978) had studied in Italy on a grant from the Junta de Ampliación de Estudios (Board of Advanced Studies). He spent one year there, between 1934 and 1935, studying, among other things, the fresco technique. His painting’s dramatic scenes, which calls to mind the effects of the fresco technique, also emulates the content of Picasso. More on Horacio Ferrer

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01 Painting, The art of War, Vasily Vereshchagin's The Apotheosis of War, with footnotes

Vasily Vereshchagin (1842–1904)

The Apotheosis of War, c. 1871

Oil on canvas

height: 127 cm (50 in); width: 197 cm (77.5 in)

Tretyakov Gallery

Apotheosis depicts a pile of human skulls set on the barren earth, the aftermath of a battle or siege. A flock of carrion birds are seen to be occupied with picking over the pile; some birds have already landed, while others are flying in or roosting in nearby trees. The shadow cast by the mound, coupled with the many black orifices created by empty jaws and eye-sockets, adds a sense of depth to the painting, further exacerbating the scale of the deathly pile.

A range of mountains serves as a dividing line for the painting, separating the vastness of the steppes from the emptiness of the sky, while the city of Samarkand can be seen in the far right of the painting. The city's walls have visibly been breached, a reference to the Siege of Samarkand in the summer of 1868 in which the Russian garrison repulsed a Bukharid attack. More on this painting

The painting was included in the Turkestan series of paintings by Vereshchagin and became the epilogue of the “heroic poem” “Barbarians,” which tells the story of the death of a Russian detachment from Bukhara troops. The author intended to call the painting “The Apotheosis of Tamerlane” and devote it exclusively to the cruelty of Tamerlane. But later decided to give greater significance and generalization to the plot and title. The inscriptions appeared on the frame : “Apotheosis of War” - at the top and “Dedicated to all great conquerors: past, present and future” - at the bottom.

Timur (Tamerlane), was a powerful ruler and conqueror of the 14th century, who created a strong state with its capital in Samarkand and revered in Central Asia and is now a saint. But his military successes were accompanied by pyramids built from the skulls of the enemy in the territories of the conquered peoples. Even in the time close to the artist, similar pyramids were still encountered. More on this painting

The Apotheosis of War is a mid 19th century painting by Russian war artist Vasily Vereshchagin. Following his completion of the painting, Vereshchagin dedicated his work "to all great conquerors, past, present and to come". Done in oil on canvas, the painting depicts a pile of skulls outside the walls of a city in Central Asia. It is considered part of Vereshchagin's Turkestan Series.

Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin, Vereshchagin also spelled Verestchagin, (born October 14, 1842, Cherepovets, Russia—died March 31, 1904, Port Arthur, China), was a Russian painter noted for his war scenes.

Vereshchagin attended the St. Petersburg Academy and studied in Paris. Devoting his life to travel, he acquired subjects for paintings from on-the-spot impressions in the Caucasus, in Crimea, along the Danube River, and in Turkistan with the Russian army. In the Balkans during the Russo-Turkish War Vereshchagin was provided with the themes for some of his famous war pictures. He also painted in Syria and in Palestine and between 1885 and 1903 traveled in Russia, the United States, and Japan. He died during the Russo-Japanese War, aboard the flagship of Admiral Stepan Osipovich Makarov.

Vereshchagin’s paintings of scenes during the invasion of Russia by Napoleon in 1812 enjoyed extraordinary popularity; innumerable reproductions of them were made. The pacifist and humanitarian movement of the time made use of his painting of a pyramid of skulls (“Apotheosis of War,” 1871; State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow). His works are to be seen in Moscow at the State Tretyakov Gallery and in St. Petersburg at the State Museum of Russian Art. More on Vasily Vasilyevich Vereshchagin

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01 Painting, The art of War, Rocroi, the last third, by Augusto Ferrer-Dalmau, with footnotes

Augusto Ferrer-Dalmau (1964–)

Batalla de Rocroi, c. 1643

Oil on canvas

height: 170 cm (66.9 in) ; width: 100 cm (39.3 in)

Private collection

The Battle of Rocroi, fought on 19 May 1643, was a major engagement of the Thirty Years' War between a French army, led by the 21-year-old Duke of Enghien and Spanish forces under General Francisco de Melo only five days after the accession of Louis XIV to the throne of France after his father's death. Rocroi shattered the myth of invincibility of the Spanish Tercios, the terrifying infantry units that had dominated European battlefields for the previous 120 years. The battle is therefore often considered to mark the end of Spanish military greatness and the beginning of French hegemony in Europe during the 17th century. After Rocroi, the Spanish progressively transformed the tercio system incorporating more of the line infantry doctrine used by the French over time. The Battle of Rocroi

Augusto Ferrer Dalmau was born in 1964 and was primarily influenced by the 1980s. The generation of artists that grew up in, and took inspiration from, the 1980s was influenced by a period of rapidly growing global capitalism, political upheaval, significant wealth differences, global mass media and distinctive music and fashion, including electronic pop music and hip hop. The nineteen eighties was the era of African famine, the height of the Cold War, and also the end of it, as marked by the fall of the Berlin Wall. influential art movements of the era include Neo Geo, The Pictures Generation and the global trend of Neo-Expressionism which manifested in Germany, the USA and Italy (where it was known as Transavanguardia). The decade was exemplified by artists like Anselm Kiefer, Jörg Immendorf, Enzo Cucchi, Francesco Clemente and Julian Schnabel. Street art and graffiti began to gain prominence, notable artists of which include Jean-Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring and Kenny Scharf. More on Augusto Ferrer Dalmau

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01 Painting, The art of War, Francisco Goya's The 3rd of May 1808 in Madrid, or “The Executions”, with footnotes

Goya y Lucientes, Francisco de

The 3rd of May 1808 in Madrid, or “The Executions”, c. 1814

Oil on canvas

Height: 268 cm; Width: 347 cm

Museo Nacional del Prado

A depiction of the execution of patriots from Madrid by a firing squad from Napoleon´s army in reprisal for their uprising against the French occupation on the second of May, 1808. The French soldiers are at the right of the composition, with their backs to the viewer. They aim their rifles at the Madrilenes who are to die. The scene´s drama and tension are emphasized by the use of light, which strongly illuminates the heroes, making it possible to distinguish their characters and attitudes in a detailed psychological character study. Along with its companion, The 2nd of May 1808 in Madrid: the charge of the Mamelukes (P748), this work was made at the initiative of the Reagent, Luis de Boubon in 1814. More on this painting

Goya’s painting has been lauded for its brilliant transformation of Christian iconography and its poignant portrayal of man’s inhumanity to man. The central figure of the painting, who is clearly a poor laborer, takes the place of the crucified Christ; he is sacrificing himself for the good of his nation. The lantern that sits between him and the firing squad is the only source of light in the painting and dazzlingly illuminates his body, bathing him in what can be perceived as spiritual light. His expressive face, which shows an emotion of anguish that is more sad than terrified, echoes Christ’s prayer on the cross:

Forgive them Father, they know not what they do. Luke 23:24

Close inspection of the victim’s right hand also shows stigmata, referencing the marks made on Christ’s body during the Crucifixion.

The man’s pose not only equates him with Christ, but also acts as an assertion of his humanity. The French soldiers, by contrast, become mechanical or insect-like. They merge into one faceless, many-legged creature incapable of feeling human emotion. Nothing is going to stop them from murdering this man. The deep recession into space seems to imply that this type of brutality will never end. More on this painting

Francisco Goya was a talented Spanish painter and printmaker, and is considered one of the last of the Old Masters of painting, as well as the first of the moderns. He began his apprenticeship in painting at the age of 14, and his talent was quickly recognized. He first submitted entries to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in 1763, and then later in 1766, both of which were denied. But, in 1771, he traveled to Rome and won second place in a painting competition and secured employment designing tapestries at the Royal Tapestry Factory. He completed over 42 patterns, which were used to cover the walls in the newly built palaces around Madrid, giving him an immediate royal audience.

In the 1780’2 he became friendly with the crown prince of Spain, spending two summers with him and his family, paintings portraits, and expanding his circle of royal patrons. He was given a salaried position as a court painter in 1786, and in 1799 was made the first court painter, painting for the king and his family, as well as the Spanish nobility.

Between the years of 1792 and 1793, Goya suffered from a mysterious illness, which made him deaf, and affected his mental behavior. Some current medical scientists believe that his deafness was a result of the lead in which he used in his paints, whereas others believe it may have been some sort of viral encephalitis. Either way, its effect on Goya cannot be understated. After his illness, he became withdrawn and introspective, and began painting a series of disturbing paintings on the walls of his house in Quinta del Sordo. His earlier themes of merry festivals and cartoons changed into depictions of war and corpses, representing a darkening of his mood. Whether this has more to do with the French declaration of war on Spain or some medical problem leading to mental disturbance is up to debate.

As such, his legacy ranges from simple portraits of the royal family to devilish portrayals of demons eating their young. His legacy also has inspired several operas, a piano suite, and a number of feature films. More on Francisco Goya

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