The latest furph. or The square dinkum oil

Place Middle East: Ottoman Empire, Turkey, Dardanelles, Gallipoli
Accession Number ART19666
Collection type Art
Measurement sheet: 25.4 x 18.9 cm; image: 19.4 x 15.2 cm
Object type Work on paper
Physical description pencil on paper
Maker Crozier, Frank
Place made Ottoman Empire: Turkey, Dardanelles, Gallipoli
Date made 1915
Conflict First World War, 1914-1918
Copyright

Item copyright: Copyright expired - public domain

Public Domain Mark This item is in the Public Domain

Description

Depicts two diggers in conversation, one (left) with can in hand, one on right with donkey. 'Square dinkum oil' was slang used during the First World War by Australian soldiers meaning the real truth or story. Furphy emerged in the early 20th century and named after the Furphy family, manufacturers of water carts (where troops swapped gossip) in Australia during World War I. Frank Rossitor Crozier was a painter and illustrator. Born in Maryborough, Victoria he studied at the National Gallery School, Victoria from 1905-1907, winning prizes for landscape and drawing. He worked initially as a decorator and clerk before enlisting in the 22nd battalion, AIF in March 1915. He served in Egypt, at Gallipoli, where he contributed to the ANZAC Book , and in France where he was attached to the 1st Anzac Corp Topographical Section in 1917. In France he served under Brigadier-General Gellibrand who asked Crozier to make sketches of the Battle of Pozieres. He was appointed official war artist in September 1918. Like fellow official war artist Will Dyson, Crozier often painted the human dimension of warfare. Following the First World War he became the first combatant AIF artist to be appointed to War Records Section in London. Returning to Australian in 1919 his commission was terminated the following year. He undertook further studies in England and the United States from 1923-24 and exhibited with the Royal Academy in London. In 1936 he was appointed an artist to the War Memorial for a period of six months and during the Second World War worked in a munitions factory in Victoria. He died in Victoria in 1948.