The Nuremberg Trial, 1946

145623498
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Use this image under Non-Commercial licence

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© IWM Art.IWM ART LD 5798

Accepted Non-commercial Use

Permitted use for these purposes:

Personal use for non-commercial research and private study and other uses under the UK’s exceptions to copyright and those exceptions to copyright in place where the user is located.

Use on websites that are primarily information-led, research-oriented and not behind a paywall.

Use on personal social media accounts, provided the individuals are not promoting themselves commercially.

Non-Commercial educational use for the purpose of teaching and instruction, including internal training.

Downloading audio-visual for non-commercial offline listening or viewing.

Free exhibitions held in venues, which do not charge an entry fee.

If you would like to use IWM collections materials in a way that is not covered above, require a commercial licence, high-resolution copies, or have manipulation requests, please contact the Media Sales & Licensing Team. Digital files of films and sound recordings are available at cost depending on intended use.

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Description

Object description

image: On the right two benches of the accused leaders stretch away from the foreground to the centre of the painting. Behind the defendants stands a line of white-helmeted military police who guard the benches and separate them from the court beyond. On the left, in front of the defendants, sit two rows of lawyers, largely in black robes. The lawyers and the defendants study sheaves of paper. In the background the painting metamorphoses into a depiction of rubble and damaged buildings, leading back towards a burning horizon.

Physical description

Label

Knight was appointed a 'war correspondent' for this commission and made a special BBC broadcast from Nuremberg. She gained special access to the broadcasting box just above the prisoners where she was able to make charcoal studies of the main protagonists amongst the lawyers and the accused. Her painting reproduces faithfully the courtroom scene and is, in effect, a group portrait of the prisoners who are shown wearing the cumbersome headphones necessary to hear a translation of the proceedings. Knight was deeply disturbed by what she heard during the trial and the painting shows a landscape of desolation floating above the courtroom like a shared nightmare. We are invited to contemplate the dreadful consequences of totalitarian power. The international tribunal at Nuremberg tried twenty-one leading Germans, headed by Hermann Goering. Eleven of the accused were sentenced to death, three to life imprisonment and a further four were given lesser prison terms.

History note

War Artists Advisory Committee Commission

History note

Exhibited 1946 Royal Academy Summer Exhibition

History note

Exhibited October 1963 Grosvenor Galleries along with two studies currently in the Ben Uri collection

History note

Exhibited July 1965 Royal Academy with 'crayon' studies

Inscription

Laura Knight

Object Details

Category

Art

Creator

Knight, Laura

Production date

1946

Place made

Great Britain, United Kingdom

Materials

Support: canvas

Frame: wood, paint

medium: oil

Dimensions

Support: Height 1828 mm, Width 1524 mm

Frame: Depth 70 mm, Height 1950 mm, Width 1640 mm

Catalogue number

Art.IWM ART LD 5798

Object associations

Associated people and organisations

Göring, Hermann Wilhelm
Hess, Rudolf Walter Richard
Ribbentrop, Joachim von
Keitel, Wilhelm Bodewin Gustav
Rosenberg, Alfred Ernst
Frank, Hans Michael
Frick, Wilhelm
Streicher, Julius
Funk, Walther
Schacht, Hjalmar Horace Greeley
Doenitz, Karl
Raeder, Erich Johann Albert
Sauckel, Fritz
Jodl, Alfred Josef Ferdinand
von Papen, Franz
Seyss-Inquart, Arthur
Fritzsche, Hans
Speer, Albert
Neurath, Konstantin Hermann Karl Freiherr von
Schirach, Baldur Benedikt von
German Army (Third Reich)
Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei
United States Army
Associated events

Nuremberg Trials, War Crimes Trials
Associated places

Germany (pre 1945 and post 1990) DE
American
Great Britain GB
France
USSR (Soviet Union) SU
Nüremberg, Bavaria, Germany
Palace of Justice, Nuremberg
Associated keywords

interior
Holocaust
Atrocities and War Crimes
artist's response
Prisoners
courts / law
Military Personnel
Bomb Damage
fire / fire fighting
politicians
portrait / personification
Associated themes

Nazi Europe

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The Nuremberg Trial, 1946

Description

Object description

Physical description

Label

History note

History note

History note

History note

Inscription

Object Details

Object associations

Associated people and organisations

Associated events

Associated places

Associated keywords

Associated themes

Our collections information

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