Norman Wilkinson is best-known as the inventor of ‘dazzle’ camouflage during the First World War, as a poster artist, and for his dramatic scenes of the Second World War at sea. Here, he depicts a very different subject; a peaceful view of the natural harbour of Poole, in Dorset, which was once a major merchant shipping harbour but is today largely a leisure-sailing one. 'Poole Harbour' was the title of pictures that Wilkinson exhibited at the Royal Academy, London, in 1960 (no.1014) and 1962 (no. 28) but whether this is one of them is not known. It is one of three similar-toned south-coast oils by him, and a watercolour, bequeathed to the Museum by Gerald Herbert Emerson in 1981. The others oils are of chalk cliffs near Rottingdean, Sussex, and yachts off the Needles, Isle of Wight (BHC2486 and BHC2487). The watercolour (PAJ2869) is of Littlestone Beach, Kent.