Much as once a week I like to take time off to cover warships (Wednesdays), on Sunday, I like to cover military art and the painters, illustrators, sculptors, and the like that produced them.
Combat Gallery Sunday : The Martial Art of Frank William Brangwyn
Sir Frank William Brangwyn, RA, RWS, RBA, may have been born in Bruges, Belgium in 1867, but he was 100% British. His father was a skilled mechanical artist, being an architect, and likely helped young Frank with his early work. By age 17 the largely self-taught Brangwyn was painting up a storm and for the next several decades plunged head first into just about every type of art imaginable, making murals (including for the 1st class dining room of the RMS Empress of Britain and others commissioned by the House of Lords), paintings, posters, stained glass, pottery, and everything in between. In fact, he is thought to have produced over 12,000 pieces in his professional career (to include 230 designs for functional hardwood furniture!)
About his myriad of styles and mediums, Brangwyn was candid, saying, “An artist’s function is everything: he must be able to turn his hand to everything, for his mission is to decorate life… he should be able to make pots and pans, doors and walls, monuments or cathedrals, carve, paint, and do everything asked of him.”
The artist himself
Frank William Brangwyn, “The freedom of the seas,” 1917. From the NZ National Art Collection
Still life; Fish, by FW Brangwyn, From the Royal Academy Collection
Seascape by Frank William Brangwyn, From the Northhampton Museum collection
When the Great War came, Brangwyn, then 47, did his full part. He produced images for war relief organizations, bonds drives, and he likewise became an Official War Artist, traveling to the Continent to capture what he saw first hand.
War to Arms Citizens of the Empire
National Fund for Welsh Troops
‘Help your country stop this” Frank William Brangwyn
Road near Cataples by Frank Brangwyn, from the William Morris Collection
“Soldiers under airburst fire”
Making Sailors: The Lookout circa 1917 Sir Frank Brangwyn 1867-1956 Presented by the Ministry of Information 1918. From the Tate Museum
Frank William Brangwyn, Going aboard, 1917
Frank William Brangwyn, “The gun,” 1917. From the NZ National Art Collection
Frank William Brangwyn, “Duff,” 1917. From the NZ National Art Collection
Frank William Brangwyn, Boat drill, 1917. From the NZ National Art Collection
Frank William Brangwyn, Youthful ambition, 1917, From the NZ War Collection
Knighted in 1941, he lived through his second world war and died in Sussex at age 89 in 1956.
Works of Frank William Brangwyn’s are everywhere, especially in the UK and Commonwealth countries. The BBC as part of their ‘Your Paintings” series has an amazing 197 of his works online while the William Morris contains the second largest collection. The Arentshuis Museum in Bruges holds the largest collection of his work (some 400 that the artist presented to the city in 1936), but visit http://www.frankbrangwyn.org/ for a full list of galleries and museums in the UK and beyond.
Thank you for your work, sir.
