''A Battery Shelled'' is a 1919 painting by the English artist

Wyndham Lewis Percy Wyndham Lewis (18 November 1882 – 7 March 1957) was a British writer, painter and critic. He was a co-founder of the Vorticist movement in art and edited ''BLAST,'' the literary magazine of the Vorticists. His novels include ''Tarr'' ( ...

. It depicts a scene from the Western Front of

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. It was commissioned for the proposed

Hall of Remembrance The Hall of Remembrance was a series of paintings and sculptures commissioned, in 1918, by the British War Memorials Committee of the British Ministry of Information in commemoration of the dead of World War I. History The artworks commissi ...

Description

A number of men are seen working and moving around in a grey, cratered landscape with improvised buildings and shattered trees. Brown, stylised smoke pillars are coming out of the ground. To the left, in front of a pile of ammunition boxes, are three men with calm and serious postures, each looking in a different direction. The men in the foreground largely have normal human traits, while the soldiers who populate the rest of the scene lack individual features. The Imperial War Museum's object description defines their unnatural, mostly light brown bodies as "marionette-like". A small officer can be seen in the background, directing a party carrying a wounded man.

Creation

The painting was commissioned by the

British War Memorials Committee The British War Memorials Committee was a British Government body that throughout 1918 was responsible for the commissioning of artworks to create a memorial to the First World War. The Committee was formed in February 1918 when the Department of In ...

. The committee had been created in 1918 with the aim to create a

with British war paintings celebrating heroism and self-sacrifice. The inspiration came from the

Renaissance The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...

, and the dimensions of the commissioned paintings were based on

Paolo Uccello Paolo Uccello ( , ; 1397 – 10 December 1475), born Paolo di Dono, was an Italian (Florentine) painter and mathematician who was notable for his pioneering work on visual perspective in art. In his book ''Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, S ...

's ''

The Battle of San Romano ''The Battle of San Romano'' is a set of three paintings by the Florentine painter Paolo Uccello depicting events that took place at the Battle of San Romano between Florentine and Sienese forces in 1432. They are significant as revealing the ...

'' at the

National Gallery The National Gallery is an art museum in Trafalgar Square in the City of Westminster, in Central London, England. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The current Director ...

. The commissions included some of the most prominent British

modernist Modernism is both a philosophy, philosophical and arts movement that arose from broad transformations in Western world, Western society during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The movement reflected a desire for the creation of new fo ...

painters at the time. The Hall of Remembrance was never realised and the paintings were transferred to the Imperial War Museum. Lewis served in the

Royal Artillery The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery (RA) and colloquially known as "The Gunners", is one of two regiments that make up the artillery arm of the British Army. The Royal Regiment of Artillery comprises t ...

at the Battle of Passchendaele and could draw from this experience when making the painting.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Battery Shelled, A 1919 paintings Paintings in the collection of the Imperial War Museum War paintings World War I in popular culture Paintings by Wyndham Lewis

Description

Creation

See also

References