Art-inspired half term activities at The Tank Museum include the Exhibition Team adding graffiti to a M4A4 Sherman, inspired by an original photograph taken at the liberation of Belgium and Holland in 1944.
The art of graffiti goes back to ancient times, starting with drawings on cave walls and developing into the graffiti seen from Banksy today.
Tanks were not immune to graffiti, either when crews were greeted as liberators by a grateful public or soldiers who had just captured their enemy’s tanks and wanted to send a triumphant message.
Tanks come with vibrant paint schemes, colourful unit markings, recognition markings, elaborate names, stencilled numbers, tank art, and even patriotic slogans, but tanks with graffiti are less commonplace.
The type of graffiti applied varies with the era and availability of resources: chalk, paintbrush, a spray can, or even just a finger in the dirt. There is little photographic evidence of the tanks of invading or occupying forces displaying much graffiti other than slogans that the crews may have applied themselves. It would take a brave individual to walk up with a piece of chalk or spray can and apply graffiti to a closed up, hostile AFV occupying a public space, and any that did get applied would probably be quickly removed.
The first real evidence of spontaneous graffiti appears towards the end of the Great War, when the Allies started to overrun the Germans. Here we can see the German A7V Elfride sporting numerous chalk markings left by the victors, be they Tank Corps, Australians, or French. The soldiers off to the side appear to be taking in all their collective handiwork.


Abandoned with what looks like an upside-down CND symbol painted on it, this KV2 is one of the prized trophies that the 12th Panzer division acquired during the opening weeks of Operation Barbarossa. Graffitiing tanks in this way allowed units to leave their mark, sending out a message to friends and foes alike that they were here first. Probably the most famous WWII Allied unit to `tag’ war booty in this way was the Scottish 51st Highland Division, which acquired the nickname the ‘Highway Decorators’ because of their penchant for tagging their HD moniker on everything they came across as they crossed North Africa.
US tanks weren’t immune to getting graffitied either. This US Army M4A3, photographed manoeuvring around a burning German truck, still retains its French white chalk graffiti along its hull side, including what appear to be dates for September 1944 and Paris. In this way, the chalk graffiti acts as an accidental historical record of the tank and its crew’s journey, at least until it rains.


US tanks weren’t immune to getting graffitied either. This US Army M4A3, photographed manoeuvring around a burning German truck, still retains its French white chalk graffiti along its hull side, including what appear to be dates for September 1944 and Paris. In this way, the chalk graffiti acts as an accidental historical record of the tank and its crew’s journey, at least until it rains.
Looking more like an art installation, this captured Iraqi Type 69-II from Operation Desert Storm 1991 displays numerous multi-coloured spray paint graffiti slogans administered by passing Coalition troops to every surface. Given the US spelling `I Mom’ on the track guards and `Saddam got his ass kicked’ on the turret. there’s a strong possibility that it was captured by an American unit.

As part of the Museum’s half term Art-A-Tank programme, visitors were able to watch history being re-enacted by our exhibition team, who used specialist conservation methods to apply chalk graffiti to a Sherman M4A4 tank in the Great Swan line-up in the WW2: War Stories Exhibition, inspired by a picture taken from the liberation of Belgium in 1944.

