A TRUE PICTURE FROM THE FRONT

Notable artist and honorary Second Lieutenant Sir Muirhead Bone, the man who became the first official British War Artist.

ART OF WAR

Sir Muirhead Bone

An artist in the Field, Sir Muirhead Bone, capturing the scene, sketchbook in hand and ration box as a seat.

Phil Jarman looks at the role of key artists during the First World War

Midway through the titanic struggle on the Western Front, when the stalemate of trench warfare was at its grimmest, an unusual step was suggested by influential propagandists in Britain. In the early years of the First World War, fledgling filmmakers and photographers recorded the scenes on the battlefields of France and Belgium. Much of the material returning from the front contained posed or staged images of troops poised for action, many standing on the fire step or actually ‘going over the top’.

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