Another country XV

Another Country XV (2001) by John Timberlake, purchased by the Imperial War Museum in 2004, included in group exhibition of contemporary art in the collection of the IWM, curated by Sara Beva

The first ever anti-football painting: A consideration of the soccer match in John Singer Sargent’s "Gassed"

The paper presents a discussion of Gassed, a large oil painting by John Singer Sargent displayed at the Imperial War Museum in London. Completed in 1919, Gassed is the major achievement from Sargent’s commission as an official war artist at the appointment of the British War Memorials Committee during the latter period of World War I. Prominent in the painting is a group of soldiers, blinded by a mustard gas attack, being lead to a casualty clearing station tent. In the distant background of the painting, another group of soldiers can be seen kitted out in football attire playing a match. The significance of this football imagery is our point of enquiry. As our title suggests, some recent interpretations regard the painting as offering critical reflection, from the time, about the symbolic links between sport and war. However, while the painting may certainly be left open to this type of viewer interpretation, archival and secondary resource material research does not support such a critical intention by the artist. Yet, nor is there evidence that Sargent’s intention was the projection of war-heroism. Rather, Sargent’s endeavour to faithfully represent what he observed allows Gassed to be regarded as a visual record of routine activity behind the lines and of football as an aspect of the daily life of British soldiers during the Great War

Football: a counterpoint to the procession of pain on the Western Front, 1914-1918?

In this article, three artworks of the First World War containing images of recreational football are analysed. These three images, In the Wings of the Theatre of War, Artillery Men at Football and Gassed, span the war from its beginning to its conclusion and are discussed in relationship to the development of recreational football in the front-line area, the evolving policies of censorship and propaganda and in consideration of the national mood in Britain. The paper shows how football went from being a spontaneous and improvised pastime in the early stages of the war to a well organized entertainment by war’s end. The images demonstrate how the war was portrayed as a temporary affair by a confident nation in 1914 to a more resigned acceptance of a semi-permanent event to be endured by 1918; however, all three artworks show that the sporting spirit, and hence the fighting spirit, of the British soldier was intact

The Spanish Civil War collection Sound Archive Oral History Recordings

CatalogueAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:GPD/1001 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreSIGLEGBUnited Kingdo

The Battle of Britain Documents May to September 1940

14 documents in a folderSIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:fGPC/0279 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo

Second World War posters

1985 reprint of 1981 second edition, original 1972SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:m00/26911 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply Centre2. ed.GBUnited Kingdo

Location of hospitals and casualty clearing stations British Expeditionary Force 1914-1919

Facsimile reprint of 1923 document; compiled by the Ministry of PensionsAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre-DSC:m00/21217 / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreSIGLEGBUnited Kingdo

Identification Friend or foe; being the story of aircraft recognition

SIGLEAvailable from British Library Document Supply Centre- DSC:OP-94/MGC / BLDSC - British Library Document Supply CentreGBUnited Kingdo