Teaching Machine-Gunners to Fire at Art 



How paintings worth thousands, the work of fa- 

 mous artists, are used to develop skill in gunnery 



Bv John Walker Harrington 



EVERY war has called in artists to 

 help the fighters. Michelangelo, 

 Leonardo da Vinci and Benvenuto 

 Cellini did their bit in their time, and now 

 come the Academicians of our own day, 

 whose ambition it is to paint landscapes 

 at which soldiers will be glad to aim either 

 cannon or machine guns. These scenic 

 targets are works of art in every sense, 

 for they must come from the skilled hands 

 of masters of perspective and atmosphere 

 and must be so ably composed that they 

 serve just as well as long reaches of hill 

 and dale and rolling uplands. The Art 

 War Relief, an organization which has 

 been enlisting noted painters for this all- 

 important work, announced that the 

 canvases of students and amateurs were 

 not available. 



Artificial Landscape Targets 



Most young men are city or town bred. 

 Hence few of the soldiers of our national 

 army have a clear idea of distances in 

 nature. As many of the cantonments 

 have not been placed amid scenery like 

 that which marksmen are likely to see 

 "somewhere in France" or "on the way 

 to Berlin," artificial landscapes are pro- 

 vided on which they can practice. The 



paintings are too valuable for cannon 

 fodder or even for machine-gun feed, but 

 they serve wonderfully well in giving the 

 illusion of panorama. The series which 

 have been painted by H. Bolton and 

 Francis C. Jones, both veteran members 

 of the National Academy of Design, are 

 typical of the kind of art which is now 

 in league with war. Some of these pic- 

 tures were used by machine-gun com- 

 panies at Camp Upton near Yaphank, 

 L. I., before their departure for over- 

 seas. 



Distance and Proportion 



As the machine-gunners "lay on" their 

 pieces in front of this pleasing mark they 

 must keep in mind two things — range and 

 close designation. The middle distance 

 in the painting carries the normal vision 

 back about 2,500 yards. The mountains 

 far in the background are supposedly 

 eight miles away and therefore out of 

 range. The canvas is covered with 

 houses and churches, bridges and culverts, 

 and even a winding stream. The gunners 

 aim their weapons at these various ob- 

 jects. The commander comes up behind 

 them and points out errors they have 

 made in sighting due in part to their un- 



^^•♦t-l^ f 





The aims of war are to aim so as to scon-. A rniliinl u piinlin.tion of a landscape 

 gives the gunner a sense of distance and proportion not otherwise easily acqu red 



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