We went last night to see Margy Kinmonth’s latest film, War Paint: Women at War, a brilliant study of the role of women artists in depicting and recording the horrors of war. The earliest was Dame Laura Knight who painted Ruby Loftus Screwing a Breech-ring, a memorable image from the Second World War. I didn’t know about Rachel Reckitt, who was Penelope Lively’s aunt and did what looked like wonderful and little known constructivist wood engravings of Whitechapel during the blitz. There was also film footage of Linda Kitson doing drawings during the Falklands War and interviews with Maggi Hambling, Rachel Whiteread and a Ukrainian artist making bread out of stones. I don’t think it is on general release, but is being shown in lots of cinemas round the country (https://www.conic.film/films/warpaint#screenings).

This is Rachel Reckitt’s picture of A Sleeping Family in a London Underground Station:-