But why should the state commission artists to record events in a seemingly anachronistic manner when photography and film would by then seem to be a much better way of doing the job? Apart from the strong tradition of having an artist record aspects of war, Kenneth Clark said later 'we employed every artist whom we thought had ant merit not because we supposed that we would get records of the war more truthful or striking than those supplied by photography, but because it seemed a good way of preventing artists being killed'. 2000 artists applied to work on the scheme, of which 300 were employed.