Jack Bridger Chalker
Encyclopedia
Jack Bridger Chalker is an artist best known for his work recording the lives of prisoners of war in World War II.

After training in Graphics and Painting at Goldsmiths College, University of London, Chalker was drafted into the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...

 before he could take up the scholarship he won to the Painting School of the Royal College of Art, London. While posted to Singapore with the Royal Field Artillery in February 1942, he was captured by the invading Japanese forces and held as a prisoner of war in Changi prison
Changi Prison
Changi Prison is a prison located in Changi in the eastern part of Singapore.-First prison and POW camp:...

 before being sent to work on the Burma Death Railway
Death Railway
The Burma Railway, also known as the Death Railway, the Thailand–Burma Railway and similar names, was a railway between Bangkok, Thailand, and Rangoon, Burma , built by the Empire of Japan during World War II, to support its forces in the Burma campaign.Forced labour was used in its construction...

. Here he recorded the lives of POWs through drawings and paintings.

After being retrieved from a hidden cache, his work was returned to him after the war. It gained wide attention when sold at auction in 2002.

Many of the paintings are now located at the Australian War Memorial
Australian War Memorial
The Australian War Memorial is Australia's national memorial to the members of all its armed forces and supporting organisations who have died or participated in the wars of the Commonwealth of Australia...

.

His works, together with those of fellow POW artists Philip Meninsky
Philip Meninsky
Philip Meninsky was the son of Bernard Meninsky. Despite an early passion for art, at his father's wish, he initially trained as an accountant, before being called up for National Service....

, Ashley George Old
Ashley George Old
Ashley George Old was an artist best known for documenting the lives of prisoners of war forced to construct the Thailand-Burma railway...

 and Ronald Searle
Ronald Searle
Ronald William Fordham Searle, CBE, RDI, is a British artist and cartoonist, best known as the creator of St Trinian's School. He is also the co-author of the Molesworth series....

 form a unique record of prisoners' suffering.

After the war he graduated from the Royal College of Art in 1951, leaving as an RBA and subsequently RWA. Later he was elected a fellow of the Society of Medical Artists of Great Britain.

He was awarded an honorary degree by the University of the West of England
University of the West of England
The University of the West of England is a university based in the English city of Bristol. Its main campus is at Frenchay, about five miles north of the city centre...

 in 2003.

External links

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