Unloading 18-Pounder ammunition at night

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Accession Number ART00132
Collection type Art
Measurement sheet: 27 x 47 cm; image: 27 x 47 cm
Object type Work on paper
Physical description watercolour with pastel over charcoal, heightened with white on cardboard
Place made France: Picardie, Somme
Date made 1918
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 soldiers from the 1st Battery, Australian Field Artillery, 41st battery AFA unloading shells for an 18 pounder gun from a limber, pulled by horses, at night, during the First World War. George Courtney Benson (1886-1960) was a painter and muralist. He studied at the National Gallery School, Melbourne from 1903 and later worked for the 'Bulletin' in Sydney, then as an illustrator and cartoonist for Melbourne 'Punch'. As a result of his drawings at Gallipoli and in France during the First World War, he was appointed official war artist in 1918. He served with the 3rd Field Artillery Brigade and from June 1916 was with the British Expeditionary Forces in France. After the war, he continued to work for the War Records Section and returned to Melbourne in 1919 to complete works for the War Memorial and spent the next decade painting watercolour landscapes and working as a book illustrator. In 1931 he moved to Western Australia to undertake work on murals. Benson enlisted in the Australian Citizens Military Forces from 1940 to 1943, working in camouflage.

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