Combat Artist

A war artist is an artist either commissioned by a government or publication, or self-motivated, to document first-hand experience of war in any form of illustrative or depictive record.Imperial War Museum (IWM)
header phrase, "war shapes lives"
/ref> War artists explore the visual and sensory dimensions of war, often absent in written histories or other accounts of warfare.Australian War Memorial (AWM)
Australian official war artists
/ref>

These artists may be involved in war as onlookers to the scenes, military personnel, or as specifically commissioned to be present and record military activity.

Artists record military activities in ways that cameras and the written word cannot. Their art collects and distills the experiences of the people who endured it. The artists and their artwork affect how subsequent generations view military conflicts. For example, Australian war artists who grew up between the two world wars were influenced by the artwork which depicted the First World War, and there was a precedent and format for them to follow.Reid, John B. (1977). ''Australian Artists at War,'' Vol. 2, p. 5.

Official war artists have been appointed by governments for information or propaganda purposes and to record events on the battlefield, but there are many other types of war artists. These can include combatants who are artists and choose to record their experiences, non-combatants who are witnesses of war, and prisoners of war who may voluntarily record the conditions or be appointed war artists by senior officers.

In New Zealand, the title of appointed "war artist" is "army artist". In the United States, the term "combat artist" has come to be used to mean the same thing.

Some examples and their background

* William Simpson was an artist-correspondent who sent artwork to London from the front during the Crimean War.Harrington, Peter
"The First True War Artist,"
''MHQ: The Quarterly Journal of Military History'', Vol. 9, No. 1, Autumn 1996, pp. 100–109.
* Alfred Waud was an American Civil War pictorial newspaper illustrator.
* Ogata Gekkō and Tsuguharu Foujita created woodblock prints for Japanese publications.
* Ronald Searle recorded life in Japanese POW camps.
* Emmanuel Leutze's 1851 studio painting of ''Washington Crossing the Delaware'' is historically incorrect, and Leutze was born decades after the event his painting depicts, but this work has become an icon of popular culture.

War artists by nationality

Argentine

*Cándido López (1840–1902), Paraguayan War

Australian

War artists have depicted all the conflicts in which Australians have been called to combat. The Australian tradition of "official war artists" started with the First World War. Artists were granted permission to accompany the Australian Imperial Force to record the activities of its soldiers. During the Second World War, the Australian War Museum, later called the Australian War Memorial, engaged artists. At the same time, the Royal Australian Navy, Australian Army, and Royal Australian Air Force appointed official war artist-soldiers from within their ranks. These embedded war artists have depicted the activities of Australian forces in Korea, Vietnam, East Timor, Afghanistan, and Iraq.

The ranks of non-soldier artists like George Gittoes continue to create artwork which becomes a commentary on Australia's military actions in war.Strauss, David Levi
"George Gittoes with David Levi Strauss,"
''The Brooklyn Rail'' (New York). July 8, 2010; Order of Australia
George Gittoes, AM
excerpt of citation, "''For service to art and international relations as an artist and photographer portraying the effects on the environment of war, international disasters and heavy industry''".

Selected artists

A select list of representative Australian artists includes:

Austrian

* Alfred Basel
* Roman Zenzinger

British

British participation in foreign wars has been the subject of paintings and other works created by Britain's war artists. Artwork like the 1688 painting,''The Fleet at Sea'' by Willem van de Velde the Younger depict the Royal Navy in readiness for battle. The Ministry of Defence art collection includes many paintings showing battle scenes, particularly naval battles.Ministry of Defence (MoD)
Battles
/ref> Military art and portraiture has evolved along with other aspects of war. The British official war artists of the First World War created a unique account of that conflict. The British War Artists Scheme expanded the number of official artists and enlarged the scope of their activities during the Second War.

Significant themes in the chronicle of twentieth-century wars have been developed by non-military, non-official, civilian artists. For example, society portraitist Arabella Dorman's paintings of wounded Iraq War veterans inspired her to spend two weeks with three regiments in different frontline areas: the Green Jackets at Basra Palace, the Queen's Own Gurkhas at Shaibah Logistics Base ten miles south-west of Basra, and the Queen's Royal Lancers in the Maysaan desert. In the field, Dorman drew quick charcoal portraits of the men she met. Returning to England, the sketches she made helped her use art to "evoke the emotions and psychological impact of war," rather than depicting the "physical horror" of war.

Selected artists

A select list of representative British artists includes:

Belgian

First World War

* Alfred Bastien, 1873—1955

Canadian

Representative works by Canada's artists whose work illustrates and records war are gathered into the extensive collection of the Canadian War Museum. The earliest war art in Canada was rock art created by Indigenous peoples from all regions of the country. During the colonial period, large-scale, European-style paintings of war dominated New France and British North America. The First and Second World Wars saw a dramatic increase in the production of war art in every medium. A few First World War paintings were exhibited in the Senate of Canada Chamber, and artists studied these works as a way of preparing to create new artworks in the conflict in Europe which expanded after 1939.Brandon, Laura
"'Doing Justice to History:' Canada's Second World War Official Art Program."
CWM, 2005.

In the Second World War, Canada expanded its official art program; Canadian war artists were a kind of journalist who lived the lives of soldiers.Art Gallery of Ontario
"Canvas of War: Masterpieces from the Canadian War Museum,"
October 2001 – January 2002. The work of non-official civilian artists also became part of the record of this period. Canada supported Canadian official war artists in both the First World War and the Second World War; no official artists were designated during the Korean War."North Korea: The Forgotten War,"
CBC News (Canadian Broadcasting Company). July 18, 2003.

Among Canada's embedded artist-journalist teams was Richard Johnson, who was sent by the ''National Post'' to Afghanistan in 2007 and 2011; his drawings of Canadian troops were published and posted online as part of the series "Kandahar Journal".

Prominent themes explored by Canadian war artists include commemoration, identity, women, Indigenous representation, propaganda, protest, violence, and religion.

Selected artists

A select list of representative Canadian artists includes:

First World War

* John William Beatty, 1869–1941
* Alexander Young Jackson CC CMG, 1882–1974
* Arthur Lismer CC, 1885–1969
* Frederick Varley, 1881–1969
* Mabel May, 1877-1971
* Marion Long, 1882–1970

Second World War

* Eric Aldwinckle, 1909-1980
* Donald Kenneth Anderson, 1920–2009
* Harold Beament, 1898–1985
* Alan Brockman Beddoe OC OBE HFHS FHSC, 1893–1975
* Molly Lamb Bobak CM ONB, 1922–2014   
* Paraskeva Clark
* David Alexander Colville PC CC ONS, 1920–2013
* Charles Fraser Comfort OC, 1900–1994
* Charles Goldhamer, 1903–1985
* Paul Goranson, 1911–2002
* Lawren P. Harris, 1910–1994
* William Abernethy Ogilvie CM MBE, 1901–1989
* George Campbell Tinning RCA, 1910-1996
* Jack Shadbolt OC OBC, 1909–1998

Recent conflicts

* Richard Johnson, b. 1966
* Edward Zuber, 1932–2018

Chilean

* Nicolás Guzmán Bustamante (1850–1928), chiefly painting the War of the Pacific and the Conquest of Chile

Chinese

* Li Hua
* Feng Zikai

Dutch

* Willem van de Velde the Elder
* Philips Wouwerman

Finnish

World War II

* Kari Suomalainen (1920–1999), Finland's most famous editorial cartoonist, worked as a war artist during World War II.

Flemish

* Vincent Adriaenssen
* Pieter van Bloemen
* Frans Breydel
* Karel Breydel
* Jasper Broers
* Laureys a Castro
* Frans Geffels
* Robert van den Hoecke
* Lambert de Hondt the Elder
* Jan Baptist van der Meiren
* Adam Frans van der Meulen
* Pieter Meulener
* Arnold Frans Rubens
* Lucas Smout the Younger
* Peter Snayers
* Jan Snellinck