Pre-war aeroplane drawings from the Blackheath School of Art

Among the collection of art works at the Conservatoire are three colour pencil drawings of aeroplanes. These have captured their time perfectly, representing not only aircraft and fashion of the late 1930’s but also of an artistic style that owes a lot to graphic design of the era. The simple metal frames do seem to be later, likely from the 1960’s or 1970’s, however the pictures do seem to be a lot older as will be discussed below. [1]

These drawings most likely date from the period 1937 to 1940 before the art school closed to be annexed by the army pay corps in 1940. Whilst I have found the source photographs for two of the drawings we have yet to discover the source for the third drawing.

Heracles

Heracles at Croydon Airport pre 1940.

Source: www.britishairways.com

Unknown artist, Drawing After British Airways promotional photograph of Heracles, colour pencil on paper, before 1940.

The first drawing depicts Imperial Airways plane Handley Page HP42 GAAXC, Heracles, at Croydon airport. As with the other pictures, the colours remain vibrant with simple lines and shading portraying a stylistic representation of a late 1930’s airport complete with pilots and passengers. Imperial Airways merged to become a part of British Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) in 1939 which was eventually the company known as British Airways in 1974. Heracles first flew in 1931 and was pressed into war service with the RAF on 3 March 1940 and only lasted 16 days before it was destroyed in a gale at Whitchurch airport, Bristol, after being blown into another plane, Hanno. Both planes were damaged beyond repair.

Douglas DST144

Press photograph:  The Launch of American Airlines’ Flagship, Texas at Grand Central Airport, Glendale 1937

Source: www.vintageairphotos.blogspot.co.uk

Unkown artist, The Launch of American Airlines’ Flagship, Texas at Grand Central Airport, Glendale 1937, colour pencil on paper before 1940.

The other is a depiction of American Airlines plane, Texas, at Grand Central Airport, Los Angeles (above right) with passengers waiting to board on the left and soldiers loading/ unloading the plane to the left of the picture. A Douglas DST144 aeroplane press photo dated 1937 is the source of this drawing. This was the aeroplane which significantly cut down the travel time from the west coast to the east coast of the USA from with the Texas in service in late 1935. [2] 

The artist added extra figures and trucks to the right side of the drawing in order to make the composition more balanced. Even though the work is essentially a copy these extra details show that the artist possessed some skill and imagination.

Dornier Merkur D1104

Unkown artist, Dornier Merkur D1104, colour pencil on paper, before 1940.

Detail of above showing pilot and passengers.

The third drawing in the series is an illustration of the Dornier Merkur D1104 plane which was built in the late 1930’s. The technique and style of this picture shows the influence of the eminent British designers and illustrators of this period: Charles Paine (who taught at the Blackheath School of Art in the early 1930’s), Eric Ravilious (official war artist), Edward Bawden (who did some advertising work for Imperial Airways) and Barnett Freedman (a prominent designer at this time who was a visiting lecturer at BSA). During this period at BSA there were a large number of students who were very skilled at creating posters and advertisements studying under Paine (see my previous entry on Charles Paine). Paine and Douglas Bliss taught Commercial Art at the school in the 1930's. The 1931 / 1932 prospectus listed the subjects that the course would concentrate on:

Training as Commercial Artists or Illustrators: Drawing from Life, Figure Designs and Composition, Painting from Life, Poster Design, Lettering and Writing, Heraldry, Costume, Black and White Drawing, Book Illustration and Decoration, Wood Engraving, Study of Historic and Modern Art, Methods of Reproduction, Study of the business requirements of Commercial Art. [3]
One student in the early 1930's, who later studied at Central St Martin's, Richard Wakeford was noted as having designs accepted by Canadian Pacific. [4]

Unlike the other two drawings I have not yet been able to discover a photograph of this plane or whether there may a photograph that closely resembles this picture. Given that the other two pictures definitely were derived from photos the odds are that this too had its beginnings in photographic form.

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[1] The label on the reverse is from Framery Ltd, 39 Blandford Street, London, W1H 3AF. The telephone number shows that the label is from before 1990 but most likely the 1960's -  01-935 4838.
[2] The Vintage Air Photos blog contains an interesting entry on the history of the plane and detailed analysis of the photograph which inspired the drawing. See entry from Tuesday 6 August 2013 entitled Legends: Grand Central and the First DC-3.
[3] Blackheath, Lee, Lewisham and Greenwich School of Art and Crafts: Prospectus & Time Table Session 1931 - 1932 p. vi.
[4] ‘Blackheath School of Art’, in Blackheath Local Guide, 28 March, 1936, p. 6. Although Wakeford was a student at the school before 1937 (the date of the source photographs) this article shows that students were involved in designs for travel.