Scenes on the Road to Hell 1991

Artist: Keane, John

Commissioned as the IWM's official artist, John Keane arrived in Saudi Arabia in February 1991, just prior to the Coalition Forces offensive 'Desert Storm'. Keane was allowed the same access rights as the press and made use of a camera and video recorder rather than a sketchbook to detail scenes and events he would later fully work up as paintings. Scenes on the Road to Hell 1991 is one of a series of six works on paper relating to the awful legacy of the Coalition air attacks on Iraqi forces fleeing Kuwait City. The scene of jubilant children celebrating 'victory' in the road (and on the disabled Iraqi tank straddling the central reservation of the highway) gives no indication of the nature of the true horrors on view only a few miles further up the highway.

© Imperial War Museum