Flammenwerfer Cartoon Painting

[leigh kitchen]

I aquired this little painting of about 9" x 8" (23 cm x 20 cm)a few years ago, it's seen better days, faded, folded & broken, painted in waters & / or ink on thick card it's now glued to another piece of card to keep it together in one piece - who knows what may be written on the back & now hidden.

I wonder what it represents, the two men appear to be praying, perhaps there's significance in the silhouette of a church in the distance?

The signature is "Benjamin Rabiel", I tried searching the web a few years ago, but to no avail.

Perhaps this is the original for a cartoon condemning the use of the new weapon in WWI?

Edited January 29, 2009 by leigh kitchen

[leigh kitchen]

The signature - also written on the painting is a number "622" inked in the bottom right corner - rather like a museum catalogue number.

Edited January 29, 2009 by leigh kitchen

[leigh kitchen]

And now, having failed in the past, I'm suddenly falling over hits on Benjamin Rabier:

Wikipedia -

Benjamin Rabier (1864, La Roche-sur-Yon - 1939, Faverolles) is a French illustrator, comic book artist and animator. He became famous for creating La vache qui rit, and is one of the precursors of animal comics. His work has inspired many other artists, notably Herg? and Edmond-Fran?ois Calvo.

Rabier started to work as an illustrator for various newspapers after meeting Caran d'Ache. His most famous creations are Gideon the duck and the characters he drew for Le roman de Renart.

[Chris Boonzaier]

I think these are more in line with those gas contamination cylinders?

best

Chris

[leigh kitchen]

Rabier is the creator of the famous "The Laughing Cow", brand trademark, which features in a current advert on British TV, & presumably else where in europe.

From "Village Antiques web site http://www.villageantiques.ch/prints/rabier/probleme.htm :

he famous french artist Benjamin Rabier (1864-1939) is perhaps best known for the laughing cow he created for the "Vache Qui Rit" cheese. Born in La Roche sur Yon in 1864, he began his career as an artist at the famous Lorraine printing enterprise Epinal and later began publishing carictaures and drawings for periodicals. From around 1906 Rabier specialized in Children's books, many of them illustrated with farm animals. One of the most popular of these was the duck named G?d?on.

This link is to the site of The International Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum http://www.micr.ch/e/exhib/explore_archives_objets2_E.HTML shows the laughing cow as the illustration on the cover of a musical score, "La Wachkyrie" & gives the origin of the laughing cow as a symbol created by Rabier to be used on a WWI unit of vehicles used to requisition fresh meat - the cheesemaker, Bel was in the same unit & later used the used the cow on his product.

This site selling a tin fridge magnet of the laughing cow gives a bit more info http://www.elfikdo.com/shop/la-vache-qui-r...tml?language=uk

"Invented by Leon Bel in 1921, the Cow which laughs is born officially on April 21. The drawing of the cow, that which will become most famous of the world, is born only in 1924, thanks to Benjamin Rabier. First of all in natural colors, then red and finally the cow a small coquettery is offered while carrying earrings. Crack for the cow of the cheese dairies BEL. Find on the plate of this table the most famous cows carrying earrings. Of its smile, it illuminates this bistrot frame table by decorating it with its red color."

Yet more on the cow: http://la-galerie-internationale.com/RABIER/vachequirit.html

THE LAUGHING COW, LITTLE STORY OF A BIG STAR

April 16th 1921, Leon Bel copyrighted the label La Vache qui rit (The Laughing Cow) and the drawing of a laughing cow, which he redone himself from a drawing by Benjamin Rabier, logo used by "The truck of supply in fresh meat" during World War I 1914-1918. This logo was nicknamed "La Wachkyrie". (Wach for "Vache" (Cow) Kyrie for "Qui Rit" (Laughing))

In 1922 - L?on Bel, after consulting with a few illustrators, choose the project by Benjamin Rabier (1864-1939). He asked the Printer Vercasson to touch-up the drawing : the cow becomes red and is wearing earrings shaped like the box of The Laughing Cow.

In 1923, Vercasson copyrighted the drawing under his name, with the title "Vache rouge", (The Red Cow), a law suit will follow which will end with Bel having to pay damages to the descendant of Vercasson in order to use the color red for The Laughing Cow.

Edited January 29, 2009 by leigh kitchen

[leigh kitchen]

I think these are more in line with those gas contamination cylinders?

best

Chris

Could be.

I should have researched Rabier before I started posting - I keep finding loads of info on the laughing cow as I go, but nothing as yet concerning this little cartoon.

It appears that Rabier & Bell served together pre - WWI, rather than during WWI? Rabier would have been about 54 years old in 1914.

In December 1885 he began service with the 33?me regiment of infantry at Arras, rising to the rank of sergeant major.

He was "in charge of the decoration of the room of honor of his regiment".

At the end of his military service in 1889, he became an accountant & a draughtsman for reviews including "Le Chat Noir".

Apparently he designed an insignia borne 1917 / 18 on aircraft of "air base 129 based with Luxeuil" - a white rabbit carrying a bundle on a stick over the left shoulder.

Edited January 29, 2009 by leigh kitchen

[bob lembke]

I doubt if it is important, but the devices pictured are not at all like actual German Flammenwerfer of WW I.

Bob Lembke

[leigh kitchen]

No, so Chris has posted in "#4".

I thought it was just "artistic license" i.e. inaccuracy, but as Chris says - decontamination equipment?

Looks like the thread could do with retitling, perhaps relocating to a different sub forum, as it's more about cheese adverts than WWI German military at the moment.

Edited January 29, 2009 by leigh kitchen

[Thomas W]

This cartoon is titled "Pi?t? Boche: L' Angelus, imit? de Millet" (Kraut piety: L'Angelus, imitation of Millet). It appeared on the cover of the December 10, 1916 edition of the magazine P?le-M?le.

It's a parody of the painting L' Angelus, by Jean-Fran?ois Millet, which depicts French peasants pausing in their harvest to pray. This cartoon is an attack on the Germans, who are piously pausing to pray in the midst of their "harvest" of mayhem and destruction created with gas/flamethrowers.

For most of the war the average non-military person never saw detailed photos or illustrations of flamethrowers, gas cylinders, or gas projectors. Rabiel's rendering of a tank with a hose and a nozzle is very common among French cartoonists. I've seen two other cartoons that show this, and they're meant to indicate both gas and flame.

In 1915 the British captured the German document Note 32, "Arms Available to the Pioneers for Close Combat: Projectors for Flame and Smoke-producing Liquid," dated October 16, 1914. It described the use of the kleine Flammenwerfer (Kleif) M.1912, the first portable German flamethrower. Note 32 was published in several French and British newspapers and used in anti-German propaganda leaflets.

From mid-1915 to early 1916 the Germans and possibly the Austrians used Kleif M.1912 to spray poison gas on the eastern front. These attacks received somewhat extensive coverage in contemporary newspapers and helped blur the line between gas and flame in the mind of the average person.

The weapons in Rabiel's cartoon are not meant to show a particular model of flamethrower or gas projector but are instead a sort of generic representation of Hun "frightfulness."

Here's a Kleif M.1912, by the way, from a Russian newspaper. It was worn by one man but operated by a squad of two. The "carrier" aimed the lance while the "assistant" stood beside him, opened the round oil-pressurization valve on the side of the tank, and then fired the weapon by opening the protruding block valve at the base of the telescoping lance, which was connected to the oil tank by means of a swiveling universal joint.

Edited January 30, 2009 by Thomas W

[Thomas W]

Here's another cartoon with the same tank-with-a-hose rendering. The two soldiers on either side are French, and the one in the middle is German.

The caption leaves no doubt that the weapon a flamethrower, since the term "P?troleur" was the nickname of French flamethrower sappers.

The translation is, "The flamethrower operator: 'I say to you, my captain, this good fellow, thinking that it's time to prepare the lamps, has brought his oil.'"

http://www.greatwardifferent.com/Great_War...throwers_01.htm

Edited January 30, 2009 by Thomas W

[Chris Boonzaier]

Good stuff Tom! Thanks for the info.