Brandon, Laura

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The Second World War Paintings of Lawren P. Harris (1910-)

Wilfrid Laurier University

Canadian Military HistoryVolume 2 | Issue 2 Article 41-20-2012The Second World War Paintings of Lawren P.Harris (1910-)Laura BrandonCanadian War MuseumThis Article is brought to you for free and open access by Scholars Commons @ Laurier. It has been accepted for inclusion in Canadian MilitaryHistory by an authorized administrator of Scholars Commons @ Laurier. For more information, please contact scholarscommons@wlu.ca.Recommended CitationBrandon, Laura (1993) "The Second World War Paintings of Lawren P. Harris (1910-)," Canadian Military History: Vol. 2: Iss. 2,Article 4.Available at: http://scholars.wlu.ca/cmh/vol2/iss2/4The son of Group of Seven ar t is t Lawren S. Harr is , a n d t ra ined in Bos ton a t the M u s e u m School of Fine Arts, Lawren P. Harr is was encouraged to become an official war ar t is t by the Canad ian High Commissioner to Great Britain, Vincent Massey. The family connec t ion of b o t h to t he Massey-Har r i s agricul tural equipment firm was a factor in their initial encounters . 1 Harr is served with the Governor General 's H o r s e G u a r d s (3rd C a n a d i a n A r m o u r e d Reconnaissance Regiment) during the first three years of the Second World War. As a war art is t he remained with t h e m as pa r t of the 5th Armoured Division in Italy dur ing 1944. Most of his war l andscapes depict t a n k s in the spec tacular hilly landscape n e a r the Melfa and Liri Rivers and towards Ortona. A m a j o r i t y of H a r r i s ' p a i n t i n g s a r e watercolours , a med ium he was not, in fact, comfortable with, considering himself an oil pa in ter . 2 Many of the waterco lours were composed on relatively small sheets of paper and the ar t is t ' s characterist ically careful and detailed application of pa in t gives t h e m ajewel-like quality. This effect is enhanced by the glowing pur i ty of the colours he used. To th is day, the small watercolours retain the freshness t h a t was thei rs a t the time they were painted a n d amply d iscount Harris ' percept ions a t the time of his wor th as a watercolourist . Opposite: CaptainLawrenP. Harris beside the wreck-age of a German PzKpjW Mark TV tank near Ortona, Italy in March 1944. (Photo by C.E. Nye/NAC PA 169090) Tank Convoy (en 12723), featured on the front cover, is a small watercolour which depicts She rman t a n k s of the 2nd Canad ian Armoured Regiment (Lord S t ra thcona ' s Horse) in convoy en route to the railway s ta t ion at Bovino-Deliceto. The town of Bovino is in the centre background. On the back cover is Boston and Mustangs near the Melfa (en 12664). In th is painting, Harris unquestioningly demons t ra tes his skill with the watercolour medium, packing in a wealth of detail and d r a m a into a space tha t is less t h a n a foot square . A l t h o u g h H a r r i s a d m i r e d t h e f lu id b rushwork of fellow war ar t i s t s s u c h as Will Ogilvie and Charles Comfort, h i s own style h a s significant p recursors in the 18th a n d 19th century English watercolour school: the work of J o h n Sell Cotman springs to mind. Cotman also worked on a small scale, and demonst ra ted wha t the med ium could achieve in t e rms of d r a m a and intensi ty in carefully worked small scale composit ions. Harris ' oil pa in t ings are generally based on his watercolours and were completed after he r e t u r n e d to England . However, he often combined a n u m b e r of watercolour images on one canvas so as to create a more complex composition — a "composite" as he called it.3 Melfa River Crossings (en 12704) [inside front cover] is a part icularly fine example of a small Harr is watercolour later used as the bas i s for an oil paint ing. Only 9" by 10", the l andscape predominates . To the right can be seen the tiny image of a damaged S h e r m a n tank . Notes on the back of the paint ing indicate tha t Highway No.6 r u n s parallel to the base of the m o u n t a i n s and tha t the town of Roccasecca can be seen in the left middle dis tance. This watercolour is incorporated into a larger oil pa in t ing of the same title (en 12705). [not shown] 29 Laura Brandon 1Brandon: The Second World War Paintings of Lawren P. Harris (1910-)Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 1993Battleground near Ortona (en 12657), a large oil on canvas, some four feet square, is based on a small watercolour approximately 11" by 15" in size entitled German Anti-Tank Position (en 12687). In the oil painting, the destroyed tree to the right of the composition is simplified, as are the background details. The tank and anti-tank gun, and the rocket trails in the sky appear in both versions of the subject. The dead horse in the foreground of the oil painting is an addition to the composition. The surreal quality of many of his pictures has been commented on in the past. Harris himself discounted this in an interview, noting that he "was doing landscapes just before the 30 war . . . [and] they were handled the same in a kind of formalized, realistic way with clarity . . . This was my natural way of working."4 After the war Harris ran the Fine Arts Department at Mount Allison University and his style of painting became increasingly abstract. During the war he had completed a number of oil portraits — remarkable for the dour seriousness of the sitters' expressions. He continued to paint portraits which display little of his abstract interests in the decades following. His war paintings are all housed at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa, the watercolour images remaining amongst his most popular works. "German Anti-Tank Position. Guns 7.5 cm. PAK 40." Near Ortona, Italy, January 1944. From a watercolour by L.P. Harris. (CWM en 12687) 2Canadian Military History, Vol. 2 [1993], Iss. 2, Art. 4http://scholars.wlu.ca/cmh/vol2/iss2/4"Battleground Before Ortona." Oil on Canvas by L.P. Harris. (CWM en 12657) NOTES 1. National Archives of Canada , J o a n Murray t ran-scr ip ts , MG 3 1 , D142, Vol. I l l , File 37, "Interview wi th Lawren P, Harr is ." 29 J u n e 1979. 2. Ibid. 3. Ibid. 4. Ibid. Additional works by Lawren P. Harris are featured in this issue of CMH. Inside the back cover can be found Gunfire, Artillery Ranges; Wales, September 1943 and on page 48 is Scout Cars in Harbour. 31 3Brandon: The Second World War Paintings of Lawren P. Harris (1910-)Published by Scholars Commons @ Laurier, 1993Laura Brandon is the Curator of War Art at the Canadian War Museum. She studied Canadian Art History at Queen's University. Ms. Brandon is currently preparing an exhibition of over 60 examples of war art for the 50th Anniversary of the Battle of Normandy and will introduce CMH readers to the exhibit in the Spring 1994 issue. 32 "Hitler Line Barrage" Self-propelled guns of the Fifth Canadian Armoured Division's 8th Field Regiment (SP), RCA firing on German positions. L.P. Harris, Oil on Canvas, 1946. (CWM en 12694) 4Canadian Military History, Vol. 2 [1993], Iss. 2, Art. 4http://scholars.wlu.ca/cmh/vol2/iss2/4

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The Second World War Paintings of Lawren P. Harris (1910-)

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