WWI Aviation books cover art

dpolglaze · 17 November 2008, 08:40 AM

Here's an oldie with an unknown artist:

Dan

Jos · 17 November 2008, 12:36 PM

Hello Ricardo and Jerry,

I only know that the jacket design of "Battle of Britain 1917" was done by Jon Wilkinson.

Jos

Pete Hill · 19 November 2008, 04:51 AM

[QUOTE=Jos;404193]This cover from Frank Wootton is used on two books.

Hi, Jos,
here's the full Frank Wootton painting that it was taken from. Its always been one of my favourite works of his. I believe that he was specially commissioned to produce it for the Time/Life Aviation series of books. He also produced covers for other books in the series, namely the one about the RAF in WW2 and the one for modern-day Jet fighters.
I read a book about his work and it contained stories of his time during the Second World War in which he served as an Official War Artist. Wootton would paint aircraft scenes on the spot in the open air, standing (or crouching) with his easel in front of the real thing. During the campaign in Normandy in 1944, Frank was painting an oil depiciting an RAF P-51 Mustang receiving maintainence and repair work. Just after he completed it, the air-raid alarm went off and he was obliged to take cover. The airfield was bombed and strafed by Luftwaffe raiders. When it was over, Frank returned to where he had left the wet canvas to find a piece of shrapnel had pierced it through the centre where he had painted the blue sky. He simply stitched the tear up, leaving the painting with a visible scar to prove that it really was 'done on the spot!'. Later, during a spell with the British Air-force in Burma, Frank had just completed an oil of a B-24 Liberator inside a large hanger when a sudden wind-storm swept through the airfield, blowing thick dust and sand everywhere and snatching the painting up and flinging it some distance away. Luckily, Wootton was using 100-Octane Aviation petrol as a medium which meant that the oil painting dried within seconds of being applied. This saved the picture as when Frank retrieved it, the layer of sand simply fell away, revealing the painting perfectly intact under-neath!
Pete

Pete Hill · 19 November 2008, 05:12 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gregvan

Hi All,

Maybe this is one book even Dan doesn't have:

It's a little paperback catalog of all the WWI paintings and other artwork (most of it done during WWI by official Bavarian war artists) held by the Bayerisches Armeemuseum in Ingolstadt. The painting selected for the cover is Luftkampf by Michael Zeno Diemer. Besides Diemer's work, the Museum also holds many of

Rudolf Stark's own paintings of aerial warfare. Diemer's Luftkampf is an oil painting (200 X 200 cm) done in 1918, and a pretty accurate depiction of Albatros C.III's in combat with British Martinsydes.

A detail also served as the cover of this edition of Alan Clark's "Aces High":

I have a special affinity for this painting. It served as a two-page "splash panel' opening for an article on WWI aerial warfare in Life magazine in 1964, part of a series commemorating the 50th anniversary of the war's outbreak. It was that series that hooked me on WWI (at the age of 9) and it was largely the aviation article - and Diemer's painting - that focused my youthful attention on the aerial war.

Hi,Gregvan,

I found another reproduction of this painting in an old book called 'Air Battles' that came out about 1980 and was aimed at younger readers. However that book did not give the title or even the artist's name so thank-you for your post, now I can put a name to this image that has stayed with me ever since I saw it when I was young.

German artist Michael Zeno Diemer, who died in 1939 at the age of 72, seems to have mainly produced landscapes and beautiful maritime works such as this one:-

However, I found this illustration of a Zeppelin that he produced, (for either a postcard or book-cover:-

Interestingly, Diemer's son Franz served as a pilot during WW1 in a Bavarian bomber unit (Boghol 8). After the war, he went to work as an engineer, test-pilot and publicity manager for Dornier and he also served in the Luftwaffe during WW2.
Cheers, Pete