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FACELESS PORTRAITS

Damien Fortin

When we memorialize armed conflicts, probably one of the first images that comes to mind is

the faces of all those who died in war. The way we have come to cope with death and the large

number of soldiers who lost their lives during the two World Wars is often mediated through war

memorials and military cemeteries situated where the battles took place. Instead of confronting

us with the brutal reality of war, as when we see pictures of fallen soldiers, these places offer a

heroic evocation of those who gave their lives. Picturing these sites is a way to suggest what is

now absent from them—the atrocities that happened there. Memorials erected on those sites

additionally create a space to mourn, remember and commemorate the dead.

In this virtual exhibition photographs of World Wars memorial sites are interpreted as the

collective portraits of those who died there. Included in this selection are also paintings by

Canadian artist Mary Ritter Hamilton (1873-1954) depicting the places where battles took place.1

Battlefields and the monument erected on them now create a space where citizens can cope with

their military past and mediate an understanding of historical events. These images offer an

interesting portrait of the collective dead and their memorializing.

Cemetery at Etaples where many brave Canadians rest. July, 1918, 1914-1919

Unknown photographer

Photograph

Canada. Dept. of National Defence/Library and Archives Canada

<http://collectionscanada.gc.ca/pam_archives/index.php?fuseaction=genitem.display

Item&lang=eng&rec_nbr=3194456>.

The Étaples Military Cemetery is a Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) cemetery

in Étaples, near Boulogne on the northwest coast of France. This cemetery, the largest in France,

holds over 11,500 dead from both World War I and World War II. The tree in the foreground of

this photograph is reminiscent in composition style of the Jack Pine painting (1916-17) by Tom

Thomson (1877 -1917) of the Group of Seven. Its position in the center of the foreground has a

similar purpose: as the pine separates the viewer from nature in the painting, the tree in this

photograph separates the living from the dead. Reminiscent of a Crucifixion in shape, the tree—

barren of leaves, yet still alive—evokes the sacrifice of Christ and of these soldiers. Such a

religious connotation, not unusual in memorial imagery, is emphasized by endless rows of

crosses reaching into the distance.

The Jack Pine, 1916-17

Tom Thomson (Canadian, 1877 -1917)

Oil on canvas, 127.9 x 139.8 cm

National Gallery of Canada / no. 1519

<http://www.gallery.ca/en/see/collections/artwork.php?mkey=11056>.

The Sadness of the Somme, ca. 1920

Mary Riter Hamilton (Canadian, 1873-1954.)

Oil on plywood, 59.50 x 46.10 cm

Library and Archives Canada, Acc. No. 1988-180-19


Item&lang=eng&rec_nbr=2835991&rec_nbr_list=2835991,2894912>.

Hamilton, known for her paintings of important World War I battle sites, was not in Europe

during the war. Hamilton believed that as time was passing by, the visible scars that the war had

left in the European landscape were disappearing.2 As such, the memory of all those who

suffered and died were being erased. The site of this painting is where the Battle of La Somme

happened from July 1 to November 18, 1916. La Somme was one of the bloodiest battles ever

fought in recorded history, with more than a million casualties over the three and a half months

period. Over 16 000 soldiers, the vast majority of them Canadian, died while taking

Passchendaele. The gloominess of the painting, its thick grey sky, pitch dark bunker entrance and

thin line of scorched trees, is telling of Hamilton’s attitude toward the war and her intense

mourning at the scene of this immense bloodshed.

Cimetière du Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry, Voormezelle, 1920

Mary Riter Hamilton (Canadian, 1873-1954)

Oil on cardboard

Bibliothèque et Archives Canada, no d'acc 1988-180-46


Item&lang=eng&rec_nbr=2894920&rec_nbr_list=181825,626883,2894908,2894946,2894

944,2894930,2894920,2894914,2894910,2835980>.

Canadian Soldiers Admire the Canadian War Memorial

at St. Julien, France, ca. 1943-1965

Photographer unknown

Photograph

Canada. Department of National Defence / Library and Archives Canada


Item&lang=eng&rec_nbr=4233269&rec_nbr_list=4233269,4233268>.

The St-Julien Memorial in Belgium holds a special significance for Canada since the 22nd and

24th Battalion played a major role in the Second Battle of Ypres. The battle is remembered for

being the first recorded use of a chemical weapon against an enemy. The Canadians were

positioned at the northern point of the line of defense when the German released tons of chlorine

in the air, the first soldiers to be exposed to the German gas. Frederick Chapman Clemesha (1876

–?) designed the monument around the figure of a brooding soldier.3 Although he had little

formal art training, Chapman was successful in several large architectural competitions,

including the Battlefield Memorial below.

Provincial Parliament Buildings showing Soldiers Memorial of Great War, ca. 1900-1925

Albertype Company

Photograph

Albertype Company/Library and Archives Canada/PA-032794



Allied Officers by World War One War Memorial in Normandy, ca. 1943-1965

Photographer unknown

Photograph

Department of National Defence / Library and Archives Canada



During the Second World War, the Canadian army saw a lot of action in Normandy and lost a

great number of men. The D-Day offensive, although overall a successful turning point in the

war, resulted in the death of some 16 000 Canadian soldiers.4 The flags in this photograph

represent the main protagonists of the invasion of Normandy: the Free French Forces, Britain

with Canada, and the United States. The picture could have been staged after the war. It shows

the later generation of officers that took command after World War One. By juxtaposing those

officers and the Normandy monument to World War One, the photographer establishes

continuity in the chain of command but also a desire to learn from the past and not repeat the

same mistakes.

Famous Menin Gate at Ypres - War I memorial, liberated by Polish of 1st Canadian

Army. Shrapnel marks from retreat of 1940, 1949

Ken Bell (Canadian, 1914-2000)

Photograph

Library and Archives Canada / e002852467



Warrant Engineer Evans, H.M.C.S. UGANDA, at cemetery, 2 February 1945

Gerald Milne Moses (Canadian, 1913-1994)

Photograph

Canada. Dept. of National Defence / Library and Archives Canada



This photograph was taken on 2 September 1945, the day it was announced that the war was

officially over. Two important battles were fought on the beach of El Alamein. At the first, in

July 1942, the allied troops stopped the Axis’s advance in Northern Africa while at the second

battle, the Allied forces broke the Axis line and forced them all the way back to Tunisia. Winston

Churchill said of this victory: “Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end,

but it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.”5 The officer in this picture is a Warrant Engineer.

His role is to supervise the operation and repair of complex mechanical and electrical equipment.

The photographer, Gerald Milne Moses (1913 –1914), was a lieutenant in the Navy. He served

on board the HMCS Uganda where he took many pictures on board the ship.

Military Cemetery at Ortona, Italy, ca. 1943-1965

Unknown photographer

Photograph

Department of National Defence / Library and Archives Canada



LESSON PLAN

This lesson plan is addressed to teenagers in high school. After visiting this virtual exhibition, I

will ask them to consider the difference between a monument and a memorial. The exercise

could also address the difference between a civilian cemetery and a military one. The students

will be encouraged to discuss these questions in groups of three to four and then present their

ideas to the whole class.

NOTES

1. Laura Brandon, “Words and Pictures: Writing Atrocity into Canada’s First World War Official Photograph,” Journal of Canadian Art History 31:2 (2010): 112. Building on Janina Struk’s and Barbie Zelizer’s research on depictions of the Holocaust, Laura Brandon argues that the captions of war photographs tend to describe what is not directly depicted in the image itself. There is a strict policy in the military not to depict the bodies of dead soldiers for political, moral and ethical reasons.

2. Mary Riter Hamilton’s journal in which she describes her motivations for painting

landscape where WWII battles took place.

3. Jeremy Black, World War Two: A Military History. New York: Routledge (2003): 116.

4. Black, 77.

5. Alex King, Memorials of the Great War in Britain: The Symbolism and Politics of Remembrance, New York (1998): 132; as well as more on naval portraits at <http://www.heritage.nf.ca/law/merchant_marines.html>.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Barthes, Roland. “Rhetoric of the Image.” The Responsibility of Forms. Translated by Richard Howard. New York: Hill and Wang (1985): 21-40. Black, Jeremy. World War Two: A Military History. New York: Routledge, 2003. Brendon, Laura. “Words and Pictures: Writing Atrocity into Canada’s First World War Official Photograph.” Journal of Canadian Art History 31:2 (2010): 111-124. Hamilton, Mary Riter. Mary Riter Hamilton, 1873-1954. Victoria: Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 1978. King, Alex. Memorials of the Great War in Britain: The Symbolism and Politics of Remembrance. New York, 1998. Osborne, Brian S. “Landscapes, Memory, Monuments, and Commemoration: Putting Identity in Its Place.” Canadian Ethnic Studies 33:3 (2001): 39-77. Robertson, Peter. Relentless Verity: Canadian Military Photographers since 1885. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1976. Thompson, Denise. “National Sorrow, National Pride: Commemoration of War.” Journal of Canadian Art History 30:4 (1995): 5.

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