Dem unbekannten britischen Soldaten in Frankreich

After the war, the Imperial War Museum commissioned Orpen to paint the peace conference at Versailles, the grand rooms and the statesmen. He delivered the statesmen, then grew disgusted with them. In 1923 he showed this hall instead, empty except for a flag-draped coffin, and beside it two ragged, half-naked soldiers and a pair of cherubs, the war's actual dead set against the diplomats' ceremony. The museum refused to take it in that form. Four years later, in 1927, Orpen painted the soldiers and the cherubs out entirely, leaving the coffin alone under the arch. What hangs now is that second version, a guard of honour with no guard, dedicated to the unknown men who did not come back.