James van den Bergh, Brasenose College (1913–1914), Killed at Vimy Ridge (May 21, 1916)

Memorial portraiture became a significant genre during and after the First World War, as families, schools, and colleges sought lasting images of young men killed in the conflict. James van den Bergh attended Brasenose College, Oxford in 1913–1914 and was killed at Vimy Ridge on 21 May 1916, part of the catastrophic British losses during the Battle of Vimy Ridge. Solomon Joseph Solomon's portrait commemorates not merely a young man but a particular generation whose deaths reshaped British society. The inclusion of his college years and the precise date and place of death in the work's title transforms the painting into something closer to a civic elegy. Brasenose College's retention of the portrait reflects the institutional impulse, common throughout Oxford and Cambridge after 1918, to keep faith with its fallen members through permanent visual remembrance.

The portrait of a young man at this date would likely balance the freshness of youth with some degree of formal composure. Solomon's sympathetic approach to sitters of all ages would have been especially apt here, producing a likeness that preserves individuality while lending the subject quiet dignity.