Background
Paul Dessau was born in London, the third of four children. His father died when he was young and he did not do well at school.
Paul Dessau was born in London, the third of four children. His father died when he was young and he did not do well at school.
On leaving school he joined a commercial art studio as an apprentice, mostly doing catalogue work for department stores. Whilst continuing to work, Paul Dessau began to study part-time at the Hornsey School of Art and then took anatomy classes at the Central School of Art and Design and eventually began to show works at various London galleries. A number of artists had joined the NFS and a firemen artists" committee was formed which included Bernard Hailstone, Leonard Rosoman, Norman Hepple and Robert Coram as well as Dessau.
The NFS agreed to assist the artists as long as their fire-fighting duties were not adversely affected and the War Artists" Advisory Committee, WAAC, agreed to consider purchasing any works produced.
In time, WAAC were to purchase at least two paintings by Dessau. As well as contributing to both WAAC and specialist civil defence art shows, the firemen held several of their own exhibitions.
In 1941, the Firemen Artist Group attracted some 64,000 people in a month to the first of twenty exhibitions they were to hold at the Cooling Galleries. In addition, four firemen artist exhibitions were held at the Royal Academy and then toured around Britain during the war whilst a further two exhibitions toured America and Canada.
Menace is a set of four canvases, now in the London Fire Brigade Museum, entitled Overture, Crescendo, Rallentando and Diminuendo, which show fire-fighters tackling a giant demonic fire figure which towers over them in the first canvas, Overture, but lies defeated in the final Diminuendo.
Dessau also contributed illustrations to the 1942 NFS anthology Fire and Water, to the 1943 WAAC booklet Air Raids and to a 1943 book on firemen co-written by Stephen Spender.