Shared Experience: A Saline Bath, RAF Hospital
Art and War
A.R. Thomson RA
A Saline Bath, RAF Hospital
oil
111.7 x 86.3cm
IWM ART LD 3629
It is surprising to see a burned airman fully naked in a bath in Thomson’s painting. His tattooed arms, holding on to the sides of the bath, contrast with the scars on his disfigured legs. The nurse, masked and black-gloved, is attentive but remote. This is a painful healing; he is isolated and in uncomfortable, hard surroundings.
Paintings
- Bomber crew
Stella Bowen - Battlefield burial of three NCOs
Ivor Hele - Tragic Landscape
Alex Colville - Japanese dead from suicide raid, Labuan
Donald Friend - A Child Bomb-Victim Receiving Penecillin Treatment
Ethel Gabain - Natives carrying wounded
Sali Herman - A Saline Bath, RAF Hospital
A.R. Thomson - Face Burns, Sgt James F. Gourley, RAF, 536215
Charles Goldhamer - Bombed Out
Will Ogilvie - Wrecked Lodestar
Eric Thake - Bomber crash
Frank Hinder