A Curation of Anzac Artists from WWII to the 21st Century 

Dealing with the history of war constitutes a challenge. No society having survived its horrors longs to revisit them, yet memory remains a crucial prism through which to augment the present and future. Forget and you risk repeating.

Eric Thake - 'The Wrong Horse'

During WWI, the Australian War Memorial created The Official War Art Scheme – a program that appointed artists to create work about war. It has since been reactivated for numerous conflicts and peacekeeping missions, contributing invaluable insights into the frantic and hellish experience of battle, as well as its everydayness. In honour of Anzac Day, this week’s curation shines a spotlight on art by these artists, spanning WWII to 2016 Middle Eastern operations. 

World War II

Sybil Craig (1901 – 1989) was just the third woman to be appointed as an Official War Artist. Rather than overseas, she was stationed at the Commonwealth Ordnance Factory at Maribyrnong, becoming the first female artist to paint women working in munitions factories. Her resulting works were small enough to carry on the tram but striking in their modernity, minor miracles in colour and design; Craig was captivated by the sight of women operating monstrous machines. 

Despite serving in New Guinea and Japan during World War II, Clifton Pugh was not appointed an Official War Artist until 1990 for the 75th anniversary of the Gallipoli landing. By then, his relationship to war had irrevocably changed. While in Japan, he’d had a particularly violent encounter with a group of soldiers which turned him into a pacifist. Pugh left combat struggling to make sense of the event, eventually finding solace with the artist commune Dunmoochin.  

Wendy Sharpe - 'Lovers With Globe'

East Timor 

Both Rick Amor and Wendy Sharpe were appointed Official War Artists during Australia’s peacekeeping missions in East Timor. Sharpe was the first woman to return to the station since World War II, commencing her duty in Darwin before journeying to East Timor for three weeks. Her resulting works were both humanistic and optimistic, paying dues to the people involved in rebuilding a nation.

Susan Norrie - 'No. 16 Series B'

The most recent Official War Artist in our curation is Susan Norrie, who was stationed in Iraq in 2016. When first asked to the position, she had to think twice – Norrie had demonstrated against the Iraq war in 2003. After reflecting on the program’s legacy and complex duties of art, however, she agreed, spending ten days embedded at Camp Taji just north of Baghdad. Her resulting body of work operated on two levels: it was a history of the Middle East in view of foreign policies, and a documentation of the day-to-day activities and people that constellate a war-stricken region. 

“We’re living in such complex times ... I just felt that as an artist, it was important to deal with the anomalies of our times… I had to follow this story through.”

- Susan Norrie

Clifton Pugh - 'Rapids above St Johns Falls'