Who painted this #65?

It looks like there's a decent number of people interested in this weekly challenge.

This next painting is one I photographed in the museum where it lives over a decade ago. 

Who Painted This #65?

I'm assuming that many of you will get the name of the artist pretty quickly. This week's challenge is reminder that the complete answer contains more details than literally who painted this

The challenge this week is to work out which one this one is - and where it is and other relevant details! Tell me the story of this painting as best you can!

Below you can find 

• The details of how to participate in this art history challenge  
• the rules of the challenge 
• the answer to last week re. Who Painted this #64 
• the names of all the people who got most or all of the answer correct
• who provided the best answer last week - which gives you an idea of what a good answer looks like

Your answers will be published next Sunday - before the next challenge.

PS I need to be upfront and say the time the "who painted this" post will get published every Sunday depends on the weather!! I'm now doing my daily walk outside again - as I did before my surgery - and had to head out this morning as I checked the weather forecast and realised it was going to start raining at midday - as indeed it did on my return home - 200 yards from my front door. I'm afraid my physio/recovery takes priority at the moment!

How to participate in "Who painted this? #64

Don't forget - there are rules to how "Who painted this?" works - and these are detailed in THE RULES for participating in this challenge.

This is about using brains not technology - so please do NOT "cheat".

Briefly, in your comment ON THIS POST you must tell me ALL of the following:

• the title of the artwork
• the name of the artist who created this artwork
• the date it was created
• the media used
• where it lives now
• how you know all this eg how did you do your search
• anything else you can find out about the artwork and/or artist - tell its story!

The Winner of this week's challenge is the first identifiable person (i.e. no anonymous guesses) who, in my judgement, is 

• the first person to get to the answer by fair means 
• AND provides the best quality answer in terms of added details about the artwork and artist

Remember also

• no use of Google image search or Tineye to find the image allowed - this is a traditional web search of images using words only plus "hit the books" time
• I don't publish the comments until next week's post.

i.e. comments are being opened up again - but ONLY for this weekly post and comments on this blog post will only be published once a week - on the following Sunday.

NOTE: You can find out more about the background to "who painted this?" and the RULES on this page https://makingamark.blogspot.com/p/who-painted-this.html

Who painted this? #64

Take Off
oil on canvas
© The Estate of Dame Laura Knight DBE RA, 2013

Title of the artwork: Take Off
Name of the artist who created this artwork: Dame Laura Knight
Date it was created: 1943
Media used: oil on canvas

Dimensions: Support: Height 1828 mm, Width 1524 mm; Frame: Depth 83 mm, Height 2073 mm, Width 1772 mm
Where it lives now: Imperial War Museum

It was commissioned by the War Artists Advisory Committee. The link tells us the purpose of the Committee was twofold

• propaganda - to raise morale and promote Britain's image abroad.
• to prevent a new generation of British artists from being killed - as had happened in WW1.

A number of people came across my blog post Review: Laura Knight Portraits (11 July 2013) which highlighted 

• various aspects of her life e.g. she was an official war artist in WW2
• her themes across the very many portraits she painted
• her approach to painting  and portraiture

AND included this painting and my photo of it in the exhibition.

In this room we have several impressive and important paintings - of RAF men inside a bomber, portraits of WAAF officers who had demonstrated heroism under fire, portraits of people working at their machines in the munitions factories and a drawing and painting of the Nuremberg trial.

The Imperial War Museum provide more information about the portrait in its label for the painting

'Dame Laura is here to paint a war picture - something to do with the talk-off or landing of a Stirling for a night operation. She said that Bert had given her an inspiration for her picture by showing her the interior of 'The Mighty F' (pilot Reggie Lown) just before they took off one night. She asked him to get out of the aircraft & get in again, & saw that her original idea had been impracticable. Then she decided to paint the crew in the aircraft getting ready for set off. She said it is the most difficult task she has ever set herself. Bert said to her, "you seemed that night as if you saw more than we could see." [...] The impression left on me was that she could see more than a few lads joking, & apparently making light of a hazardous enterprise. She could see beyond their exteriors, & the front that hid each individual from his fellows. The picture should be interesting.' Flight Officer Menna Walden-Jones, RAF Mildenhall, October 1943

Who guessed correct?

Ten  people left comments - and the following people identified the artist, the title of the painting and where it can now be found.

Remember the person I identify as the best answer is not necessarily the first person to answer. Plus you do need to say how you know.....

• Judy G - was first to get most of the right answers
• Theresa - was the first to get all answers correct
• Cathy Ward - provided an excellent answer
• Eveque - got the artist and subject correct
• Celia Hart -recognised the artist and got the answers via an astute Google query. It always helps when you know who the artist is!
• Mike Whalley - got the artist but his answer lacked detail.
• Ray Heaton - provided the BEST and most complete and interesting answer overall! Plus also recommended this video

• There were a couple of anonymous I let through - but I need to emphasise that in general I won't publish anonymous. Try getting a Google account.