Chelsea Pensioners Receiving the Gazette Announcing the Battle of Waterloo by David Wilkie Art Print

A despatch from Waterloo arrives at a Chelsea pub and the whole street stops to hear it read aloud. David Wilkie finished the picture in 1822.

The Duke of Wellington commissioned it and got back something he had not asked for: not a battle, but the news of one, landing among old soldiers, wives, children and a dog. Every face is doing something different. When it was shown at the Royal Academy the crowd was so heavy that a rail had to be put up in front of it — the first time the Academy had ever needed one.

Wilkie was a Fife minister's son who made his name painting ordinary people at close range, and this is the picture that proved a crowd scene could carry a nation's news.

The original hangs at Apsley House, London.

Printed to order on heavyweight archival paper with a narrow white border that keeps the painting's own proportions. Framed in black, wood or white at 30 × 45 cm and 60 × 90 cm; the 40 × 60 cm sheet is unframed, for your own frame. Shipped worldwide.

• Archival paper, fade-resistant pigment inks
• Unframed in every size; framed in black, wood or white at 30 × 45 cm and 60 × 90 cm
• Made to order and shipped worldwide