Sketchbook containing 56 pages of drawings from his service during the First World War

Accession Number ART03605
Collection type Art
Measurement Overall: 41.5 x 29.4 x 4.2 cm
Object type Sketchbook
Physical description pencil, pen and ink, watercolour and gouache (in book); brush and ink and watercolour (on dust jacket)
Place made Belgium, Egypt, France, Ottoman Empire: Turkey
Date made 1914 - 1918
Conflict First World War, 1914-1918
Copyright Item copyright: © Australian War Memorial
Creative Commons License This item is licensed under CC BY-NC
Description

Artist's scrapbook comprising 56 pages with 143 drawings and watercolours from sketchbooks attached to leaves of the scrapbook with notes. The works describe the artist's travels from Australia to Egypt, Turkey, the Mediterranean, Belgium and France as a soldier and official war artist. The book has a buff dust jacket covering a blue cardboard cover.
George Benson (1886 - 1960) studied at the National Gallery School, Melbourne, from 1903 to 1904 and worked with the poster designer, Harry J Weston. He was subsequently engaged in cartoon work and verse illustrations for various magazines including the 'Bulletin', Australian 'Punch' and 'Sporting and Dramatic News'. Benson enlisted in September 1914, with the 3rd Field Artillery Brigade, serving in Egypt and Gallipoli. He served in France in 1916 with the British Expeditionary Force, later undertaking a camouflage course in England and being appointed an official war artist working as Officer in Charge of Camouflage attached to the 4th Division AIF in France in 1918. Following the war he undertook work with the Australian War Records at St. John's Wood in London. Benson returned to Melbourne in 1919 and his commission was terminated in 1920.

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