Edward Brodney, Painted War Scenes, 92
DGH
Edward Brodney, an artist assigned by the Army to paint idyllic pictures
showing World War II soldiers praying, eating and playing baseball -
anything but being blown apart by bombs - died on August 3, 2002, at his
home in Lake Worth, Florida, at the age of 92.
His daughter, Jeanne Brodney, said he had strict orders to show "no
blood or guts" in his paintings, which were reproduced and sent to
newspapers throughout the United States. The essential idea, the Army's
public relations department stressed, was to show Americans that the
soldiers were safe, at least some of the time.
But in many cases the pictures transcended their military purpose,
telling far more than photographs or movies. They could freeze moments,
capture moods. Mr. Brodney told this story in an interview with CBS News
in 1995:
"It's Sunday morning. I come out there, and the chaplain is getting
ready, the men are coming down and kneeling. I looked up and that
cathedral - a jungle cathedral - the lights were streaking down through
the trees. It was magnificent. There was a holiness in this place, and
it was only a jungle. But a camera would never get it."
Edward Brodney was born in Boston on April 15, 1910. His father was a
fisherman who also owned a fish store. He started formal studies at the
School of the Museum of Fine Arts and at the Massachusetts College of
Art while he was still at English High School in Boston. He also studied
at the School of Fine Arts at Yale before finishing a six-year course at
the museum school.
In 1936 Mr. Brodney won a competition sponsored by the Federal Works
Progress Administration, which supported many artistic projects during
the Depression, to paint a mural for the Massachusetts Statehouse. It
was called "Columbia Knighting Her World War Disabled," and he persuaded
friends to pose, since the W.P.A. could not afford models.
The next year he won a competition to paint a mural for the city hall in
Newton, where he lived until moving permanently to Florida several years
ago. It memorialized the Rev. William J. Farrell, a heroic World War I
chaplain.
Then in 1938 Mr. Brodney won another W.P.A. competition to paint a
second mural in the Statehouse. Called "World War Mothers," it is one of
a handful of military murals with women as subjects. Mr. Brodney used
poor women in settlement houses as models to capture "a faraway look of
wanting and loss." After federal funds ran out, he used his own money to
finish the project.
In 1940 Mr. Brodney was drafted into the Army, under a program that
required just one year of service. He saw it as an artistic opportunity.
"I feel it will open up a new field for my work," he said in an
interview with The Boston Globe in 1941.
It did. He was assigned to paint "YD," for Yankee Division, on what
seemed like an endless inventory of trucks and jeeps at Camp Edwards on
Cape Cod.
He had his release papers in hand on Dec. 7, 1941, when the Japanese
bombed Pearl Harbor. He was soon on a ship to the South Pacific, where
the war became real when he heard the voice of Tokyo Rose, the Japanese
propaganda broadcaster, mention the name of his ship.
Mr. Brodney was among the first American troops to land on New
Caledonia. Though officially a medic, he carried sketchbooks,
watercolors and oil paints. When a general saw how well he had
camouflaged the tents of his medical compound, he was made chief of
camouflage for all of New Caledonia.
When another general saw some of his paintings, he was assigned to the
public relations staff. His first job was to paint portraits of aces -
those pilots who had shot down at least five enemy planes - to be sent
to their hometown newspapers.
As the war progressed, he moved through the South Pacific with American
troops. He painted many pictures of the wounded, as well as scenes of
gruesome combat, which were not part of his public relations work.
After the war Mr. Brodney returned to Boston, where he married the
former Libby Fireman. In addition to his wife and his daughter, who
lives in Wayland, Mass., he is also survived by his brothers Oscar, of
Beverly Hills, and Fred, of Newton; his sister, Betty Feldman of
Martha's Vineyard; his son, Richard, of Boston; five grandchildren; and
one great-grandson.
After the war he opened a gallery selling art and antiques. After almost
dying of pneumonia at 65, he returned to painting full time, turning the
gallery over to his son.
He loved to paint the sailboats and polo fields and perfect days filled
with perfect light. The family did not know he had 120 paintings from
World War II in his basement until someone from the Pentagon called in
1995 to ask if he kept any of his wartime work.