
Lucia Tro Santafe
International Senior Specialist
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£12,000 - £18,000
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International Senior Specialist
The scene depicted is at Messines in West Flanders, where the Allies dug a series of tunnels under the enemy lines and filled them with explosives. On 7 June 1917, the explosives were detonated simultaneously, devastating the German front line and creating 19 large craters. Nash was serving with the Artist's Rifles in one of the trenches, but the day before the offensive he had broken a rib and was invalided home. So, this may be a tribute to his fallen colleagues. Having witnessed the battle of Passchendaele, Nash was well aware of how to depict the desolation of a destroyed landscape.