An Escalator In An Underground Factory, 1944 (watercolour, gouache, chalk on paper)

Creator: Dobson, Frank (1886-1963) Rows of female war factory workers in white overalls descend an escalator to start work for The Plessey Company PLC in the converted tunnels of Gants Hill Underground Station, London, 1944. Plessey, a manufacturing company with vital expertise in radio and aircraft equipment, took over a two mile section of newly constructed tunnels of the London Underground in order to maintain production. The tunnels between Leytonstone and Gants Hill were part of a scheme to extend the Central Line into East London and the only access was via stairs at the intended stations. Frank Dobson was a British official war artist, widely acclaimed as a pioneer of modern sculpture. During the First World War he enlisted in the Artists Rifles, experiencing shell shock at the Somme in 1916. In the Second World War, the War Artists Advisory Committee purchased portrait busts and several paintings, and after the war Dobson became Professor of Sculpture at the Royal College of Art.