Museums What's On
Watercolour at War
Venue: Laing Art Gallery
Date: Nov 17th 2018 - Mar 1st 2020
Time: 10:00 - 17:00
Price: Free
Detail
Stemmed from the Laing’s recent acquisition of Edward Burra’s Landscape with Red Wheels (1937-9), Watercolour at War is the first in a series of exhibitions that critically examine why artists have chosen to use watercolour. Due to suffering from rheumatoid arthritis and a debilitating blood disease, Burra struggled to work upright at a canvas and instead chose to work flat on a table in watercolour. During the First and Second World Wars, war artists used watercolour out of necessity. The medium is portable, adaptable and quicker-drying than oil paint meaning that they could work at speed to capture what was happening around them. The exhibition focuses on the Second World War and the interwar period in Britain. It also highlights wartime printmaking through the Artists International Association (AIA) Everyman Prints.