The quick development of technology, materials and scale during the industrial revolution changed the battlegrounds of war in the nineteenth century. Invention and science drove the ingenuity of weapons, with pride and greed fuelling their use across the world. The intentions behind such advancement can be chilling, maximising destruction and often putting profit before protection as new methodology was sold between enemies.

The pages of Modern French Artillery look to celebrate the advancement of weaponry in the late 1800s, yet their detail reveals layers of stories that questions the lines of intent. Emerging from the pages are intricate illustrations of warships, lists of numerous weapons and the impressive weight and firing range of ammunition; a metallic multiplicity of epic proportion. Darkly these images are framed by the shadows of time and consequence past, black as the blinding smoke of cannons and the depths of the sea that keeps many watery graves. This darkness is punctuated with the jagged edge of intense crimson, the deep welling of blood shed by these inventions.

The wheels of cannons, turning circles of machinery and the long shafts of gun barrels run across the folds; cool, large and metallic, emphasising sheer size, power and tenacity. The guns’ aim points inward from each side of the triptych; Francisca turns them against one another in crossfire, a reminder of the uncertain and quick changing nature of war. In the centre are the ships, immense and pointed structures, emerging as ghostly skeletons of fraught battles tossed about on the waves. Tiny men – miniature at the wheel of enormous weapons or lined like figurines on deck – remind of scale and the reality of fighting, of the inevitable mass loss of life. ‘Intention’ is a powerful work, reframing a history all too often told with bravado and conquest. These images were drawn from reality and though today our battles look very different, the lines of intention are just as questionable.