Adrian Keith Graham Hill (1895 – 1977) - British Artist

Adrian Keith Graham Hill was born in Charlton, London on 24 March 1895.  His parents were Graham and Emma Matilda Hill.  He was educated at Dulwich College and went on to study at the St John's Wood Art School between 1912 and 1914.

When war broke out, Adrian enlisted with the Honourable Artillery Company. Because of his artistic abilities, he was assigned to a Scouting and Sniping Section, whose work often involved operating in front of the Allied trenches to sketch enemy emplacements.   Later in life, he described a typical patrol into no man's land:

"I advanced in short rushes, mostly on my hands and knees with my sketching kit dangling round my neck. As I slowly approached, the wood gradually took a more definite shape, and as I crept nearer I saw that what was hidden from our own line, now revealed itself as a cunningly contrived observation post in one of the battered trees."

Adrian was the first artist to be commissioned by the newly-created Imperial War Museum to record scenes on the Western Front.  Between 1917 and 1919 he made 180 pen-and-ink drawings showing the examples of the devastation in France and Belgium and the work of troops of different nationalities in the trenches.

"Behind Gavrelle" Adrian Hill

After his First World War service, Adrian studied at the Royal College of Art before working as an artist.  In 1938, while convalescing from tuberculosis at the King Edward VII Sanatorium in Midhurst, he passed the time by drawing nearby objects from his hospital bed.  Adrian found that helped his recovery. In 1939, occupational therapy was introduced to the sanatorium for the first time and Ardian was invited to teach drawing and painting to other patients - at first to injured soldiers returning from the war, and then to general civilian patients.  He found that the practice of Art seemed to help to divert the patients and to relieve their mental distress.

Adrian noticed that art appreciation also aided recovery from illness and he became involved with the British Red Cross Society, setting up a scheme whereby reproductions of famous artists' works were lent to hospital wards all over the country. Speakers were also booked to talk to patients about their artworks. By 1950 this picture-lending scheme had spread to nearly 200 hospitals, and there was a waiting list.

The artist Edward Adamson joined the program in 1946 as it was extended to the long-stay mental asylums, and started classes at Netherne Hospital in Surrey.  Adrian apparently coined the term "art therapy" in 1942 and in 1945, he published his ideas in a book entitled "Art Versus Illness".

Eugène Galien-Laloue (1854–1941) - Official French WW1 artist

Eugène Galien-Laloue was a French artist, born in Paris on 11th December 1854.

The Republic of France selected Galien-Laloue to work as a war artist during the Franco-Prussian War and the First World War, chiefly in watercolor but I haven't been able to find any examples of his WW1 paintings.

Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson (1889 – 1946) - artist

Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson (1889 – 1946) was the son of the War Correspondent Henry Nevinson.

On the outbreak of the First World War, as he was a pacifist, Christopher refused to become involved in combat duties, and volunteered instead to work for the Red Cross. Posted to the Western Front in November 1914, he worked as a driver, stretcher-bearer and hospital orderly. Christopher returned home in January 1915.

The following month he wrote in “The Daily Express” newspaper: "All artists should go to the front to strengthen their art by a worship of physical and moral courage and a fearless desire of adventure, risk and daring and free themselves from the canker of professors, archaeologists, cicerones, antiquaries and beauty worshippers."

Christopher then joined the Royal Army Medical Corps. On 1st November 1915, he married Kathleen Knowlman at Hampstead Town Hall.  His Mother, Margaret Nevinson later recalled: "My son informed me, suddenly, one evening that, though not engaged, he meant to get married before he was killed." Instead of being sent to France he helped nurse soldiers being treated at the Third General Hospital in London. After contacting rheumatic fever in January, 1916, he was invalided out of the army.

Painting "La Mitrailleuse" by Christopher Richard Wynne Nevinson in 1915

Nina Hamnett (1890 – 1956) Welsh artist and writer

Nina Hamnett was born in Shirley House, Picton Road in the coastal town of Tenby, Pembrokeshire, Wales on 14th February 1890. Her father George Hamnett was an army officer, born in Chennai (formerly Madras), India. Her mother Mary was born in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador.

Nina was sent to a private boarding school at Westgate-on-Sea before moving on to the Royal School for Daughters of Officers of the Army in Bath, Somerset from 1902 to 1905.

Her father was dishonourable discharged from the army and worked as a taxi driver. From 1906 to 1907 Nina studied at the Pelham Art School and then at the London School of Art until 1910.  In 1914 she went to Montparnasse, Paris, France to study at Marie Vassilieff's Academy.

Nina went on to become an accomplished artist and writer, and an expert on sailors' shantys. She became known as the "Queen of Bohemia" for her eccentric behaviour. She was a regular contributor to “The Coterie” Magazine.

Hamnett died on 16th December 1956.

Paintings:

Nina Hamnett painted by Roger Fry (1866 - 1934) in 1917, was wearing a dress designed by Vanessa Bell and made at the Omega Workshops

WW1 painting by Nina Hamnett - Portrait of Major General William Bethune Lindsay by Nina Hamnett - Canadian War Museum

Sources: http://zone47.com/crotos/?p=8&p195=1032442  and Wikipedia