Thomas Hennell applied to become one of the War Artists Advisory Committee's war artists in 1939. In 1943 he volunteered to replace Eric Ravilious in Iceland after Ravilious’s untimely death. It is even more poignant that Hennell shared Ravilious’s fate as one of the three official war artists killed on active service. In one of his rare scenes of the home front, Hennel depicted women’s involvement in the war effort, their busy activity evoked by the vigorous handling of the watercolour. The figureheads around the room remind us that Portsmouth was one of the Royal Navy’s main ports. The room shown is almost certainly the interior of the Victory Museum, now part of the National Museum of the Royal Navy.