Skip to playerSkip to main content
BRITCOM 4
  • 6 hours ago

Category

📺
TV
Transcript
00:00I was living in America when 9-11 exploded the world as we knew it.
00:20America's response was swift.
00:23And just weeks later,
00:26Australian forces also headed to Afghanistan, joining the war on terror.
00:33Overt operations shrouded the war in secrecy,
00:37and it lasted almost 20 years.
00:43But more than a decade into the conflict,
00:45it was one of Australia's official war artists, Ben Quilty,
00:49who laid bare the hidden truth of the price of our war in Afghanistan.
00:56And that was just the start of a national reckoning
00:59with what really happens when the war is over.
01:08I'm Rachel Griffiths,
01:09and I believe that when it comes to understanding war,
01:13art is our secret weapon.
01:16So in this series, I'm putting this theory to the test,
01:21one war and one artwork at a time.
01:27Because while journalists tell us what happened...
01:30They left in scenes that are now part of television's history.
01:33It's our performers...
01:35When the song was released, it was banned.
01:37Yeah.
01:38Filmmakers...
01:39Peter, we have a...
01:42Writers...
01:43The narrow road to the deep north.
01:45Artists...
01:46I was the only one not carrying a weapon.
01:48And musicians...
01:49If it's too risky to say, sing it.
01:54Who help us make sense of it.
01:56Holy...
01:57This is incredible.
01:58It's incredible.
02:03Art's not just there to be pretty and admired.
02:05Art is the magnifying glass and the mirror.
02:08This was a pub rock song that changed our lives.
02:11That's what art can do.
02:14This is when the war is over.
02:28Beauty and pain are old bedfellows when it comes to art.
02:52Wow.
02:53Well, I have to say this is a brand new experience for me.
02:56I've looked at a lot of art.
02:59But this is...
03:00The skin is the canvas.
03:01Yes.
03:02You're the canvas.
03:03And you get to wear it all the time.
03:06Adam Maguire is a man who wears his heart and his art on his sleeve.
03:12Here we go.
03:13The big reveal.
03:14A veteran of over 28 years.
03:16The war in Afghanistan was his final deployment.
03:20Holy shit.
03:21This is...
03:24This is incredible.
03:27Can I say this is an excellent use of love handles?
03:31Yes.
03:32Because these poppies have a beautiful three-dimensional quality.
03:37Among his tapestry of tattoos that tell stories about his and his family's decades of service, there's a tattoo for a mate who's close to his heart.
03:49There's just something special about Davey.
03:53He was a reservist when I did my first deployment in 2006.
03:58He was dead set.
03:59I'm joining the regular army.
04:00And we tried to hold him off.
04:02But he went over to Afghan.
04:04They were out doing a patrol and he ran over a very large IED.
04:10And never come back.
04:15How long was he in Afghanistan before he...
04:18Not long at all.
04:20I think it was probably a month.
04:22Oh my God.
04:23Yeah.
04:24How'd you find out?
04:25I got a phone call, Sarge, I think Davey's dead.
04:31And I was like, nah, I spoke to him yesterday.
04:37You got a tattoo for him, right?
04:38Yeah, that's in the middle of my chest here.
04:40In the actual cross, it's got RAP Davey.
04:43Burdened by the loss of his mate in service, Adam chose to redeploy to Afghanistan in 2012.
04:51I couldn't say no to going to Afghan because your mates go or go and some don't come back.
04:58So, you just sort of can't say no.
05:12When Australia joined the US-led war on terror in Afghanistan,
05:16the mission was to hunt Osama bin Laden, defeat his Al-Qaeda terrorists and overthrow the Taliban who harboured them.
05:29Over nearly two decades, there were almost 40,000 Australian troops deployed.
05:35Around 170,000 Afghans died in the war.
05:40America lost almost 2,500 soldiers.
05:46And while 41 Australians were killed in combat, at home, a far bigger toll was yet to come.
05:58You got a poppy for every Australian that died in Afghanistan?
06:03Yeah.
06:05Now, you're seeing a lot more veterans with the tattoos.
06:10And I think that it helps.
06:12That's becoming known as form of therapy.
06:15I would say, yeah.
06:17The pain of getting a tattoo realistically lets you know you're alive.
06:21I mean, some people write journals and keep journals.
06:24My journal's in ink.
06:26It feels right to put it into images.
06:28Yeah.
06:35For hundreds of years, the stories of war and the art that tells those stories was largely populated with heroes and battles.
06:43These generals on horses, flags above the battlement, nameless soldiers fallen in noble sacrifice.
06:51But the art of our most recent war in Afghanistan is so different.
06:58It's visceral.
07:00It's immediate.
07:01And it punches you in the gut.
07:03And it's very, very personal.
07:06I took no paint to Afghanistan.
07:16I made lots and lots of film and took lots and lots of photographs and a pot of ink.
07:21And I thought that would lead to telling the story.
07:24The risk and the fear and the trauma and the danger of being there.
07:27In 2011, Ben Quilty was a celebrated and highly collected artist.
07:33And when he won the nation's most coveted art prize, his fame hit new heights.
07:38The 2011 Archibald Prize is awarded to Ben Quilty.
07:43For Margaret Olly.
07:44That same year, the Australian War Memorial commissioned him as the official war artist to Afghanistan.
07:57I went in there pretty naive.
08:00I was the only one not carrying a weapon, which is an unusual feeling to be there unarmed in a war zone.
08:08Every single emotion was extreme and heightened, partly because you're living under this constant anxiety that you can be killed.
08:20And it was like nothing I'd ever seen and nothing I want to see again.
08:23I don't want to go back, that's for sure.
08:25Ben Quilty was following in the footsteps of a long line of official war artists whose role was to capture our troops at the coalface of conflict.
08:35The official war artists can be as political or as anti-war or as pro-war as they want.
08:44And that's a rare privilege, I think.
08:47Given the environment was special forces, is there a suspicion?
08:51Very suspicious.
08:52What's this artist doing here, this lefty?
08:55They didn't know who I was, they didn't know why I was there.
08:58Making a drawing of someone is very disarming because the person who's making the drawing has to opt out of the dialogue.
09:09They were very, very reticent to talk to me because it had been drilled into them.
09:14Do not talk to the media, never ever talk to the media.
09:17I had no idea who this guy was.
09:24We have to be careful in what we say here, that's what we're thinking, you know.
09:28Are you thinking why do we need an artist in Afghanistan?
09:31Absolutely, it's very strange.
09:34Daniel Spain was one of the youngest ADF personnel on Australia's main base.
09:39And he said, I want to take some photos of you guys doing some weird stuff.
09:44You know, I'm like, right, eh?
09:47So he says, look at the sun.
09:48And he took these photos of us.
09:52Ben's aim was to capture the human inside the uniform.
09:58Daniel Spain, he was so young, I was astonished.
10:02I asked him awkwardly when I realised how young he was, does your mother know what's happening here?
10:09And a huge tear welled in his eye.
10:12That was a real turning point for me.
10:15And that's why I have made that first painting of Daniel when I got back.
10:21I was there to tell the story of the troops.
10:24I felt aware that so many of the young men and women had this extra pressure.
10:30That they were bound by a contract not to speak about their service.
10:35Not even to discuss how they felt.
10:45Recognising the crushing nature of this code of silence was a light bulb moment for Ben.
10:52For me, the biggest story was not the combat zone, but more commonly the emotional wounds.
11:00Putting this thing that you felt and saw and heard into paint.
11:05Tell me, how does that happen?
11:07For me, the skin was everything.
11:09The way the uniform was cut to be boxy, aggressive, masculine.
11:14So I then asked them to strip off and pick a pose.
11:18Captain S was a young officer in Afghanistan.
11:24I asked him to pick a pose and he straight away said,
11:28yes, I know the pose.
11:30And he lay on his back in the unbelievably uncomfortable position.
11:34As we made the work, he told me the story of why that pose was important.
11:39And he said that there was many, many battles, but this one I remember for the physicality of being stuck on my back for so long.
11:51And they couldn't work out where they were shooting at him from.
11:55And he was with a very young soldier.
11:57And the friend was hit with a bullet, which went into his body and didn't come out.
12:06And I said, what did the young man say?
12:10He just kept saying over and over again, I don't want to die.
12:14I don't want to die.
12:15In this painting, I tried to leave as much of the skin blank.
12:29By leaving the skin white, it's like there's a bright light shining on it.
12:34And the light is everything that comes with the threat and the furious danger of being in a place like that.
12:40By 2013, Ben had painted 21 portraits, laying bare the trauma of return vets.
12:59It's just so vulnerable.
13:01I'm sure when Ben Quilty was on the base, this was not what the guys would have been expecting that he would come up with.
13:16Certainly quite different to an official war artists commission, maybe.
13:23It's definitely the cost of war.
13:25Pretty wild.
13:40The show's called After Afghanistan.
13:43Have you seen your painting yet, before you turn up at the opening?
13:47No, I hadn't.
13:49And I was talking to someone and they're like, oh, you're one of the guys who painted in the nude?
13:53Are you thinking, what, what, nude?
13:55Yeah, what have I done? Did I forget?
13:56What the hell?
13:57Yeah, what was happening?
13:58Because I didn't, from my memory, I didn't pose nude for Ben Quilty.
14:03Do you think he captured something about you at that time in that painting?
14:12Absolutely.
14:13I was very much down on my luck, you know, feeling depressed and I was heading down a slippery slope.
14:24Just like...
14:35Are you kind of home before you've processed where you've been?
14:41When I got out, I drank a lot.
14:44So you're not decompressed at all?
14:45No, no.
14:46And like, I scared my kids.
14:49You go to dark places and like, because of the transition, when I got out, I was like,
14:57right, are you getting out of the army now?
14:58And I was like, no house, didn't know where the next dollar was going to come from as such.
15:04In my head, well, if I just write myself off, the wife and kids will get the money a lot quicker.
15:16The timeliness of the official opening and Ben reaching out and it couldn't have come at a better time.
15:25And that needed to happen to be where I am today.
15:28Through all that, Ben became quite an advocate because all his soldiers that he met had been having very similar experiences.
15:42Do you think what he was able to do with that work is an important role to have an artist witness war like that?
15:50I think every facet needs to be looked at.
15:52But he's got two there where what the body looks normal, but the head is just red.
15:57And that's just like almost like a pink mist.
16:01You'd say Ben captures the vulnerability of the returning soldier who's not like the photos of yesterday's war hero.
16:09Right?
16:10It doesn't glorify it.
16:12What these paintings do, they put on the table the thing that we won't tell our families,
16:16the things that we won't for embarrassment or fear or uncertainty of perception,
16:23we won't put in front of you as we walk down the street.
16:28A decade later, it wasn't a civilian like Ben Quilty,
16:31but a returned vet who continued this important conversation.
16:36And for her, it wasn't just art.
16:38It was evidence.
16:39In the army, you were taught loyalty up, loyalty down.
16:50So if you serve with diligence and loyalty, they'll look after you.
16:54And it just felt like that contract had been broken after we'd given so much.
16:58Artist Kat Ray served in the Australian military for 20 years with multiple deployments in Afghanistan.
17:09Her husband Andrew also served there.
17:14Andrew, tell me about him coming back after his last deployment.
17:19Well, I didn't realise they'd done a suicide risk assessment on him.
17:23And I didn't know. I got a call to say,
17:28you'll need to come and collect him from Sydney Airport.
17:31With no awareness?
17:33No, they threw me like a, I guess a hot potato as far as mental health.
17:40He was in chronic pain.
17:42Every part of his body was physically broken.
17:44And then there was also the mental health bit.
17:46I guess increasingly, there was domestic violence against me as well,
17:49which became more and more dangerous to be around.
17:56In 2017, Andrew died by suicide.
18:04Harnessing her grief and anger, Kat found healing through her creative process.
18:11Oh.
18:12And produced an artwork.
18:14Oh, wow.
18:15That is astonishing.
18:16God.
18:18She called it Death Min.
18:21Death Min is the actual paperwork from Andrew.
18:27Which was his DVA files, his medical files.
18:31It's my height and the weight of Andrew.
18:35He was trying to get all of his claims in for Department of Veterans Affairs.
18:39What was he asking for?
18:40He was asking for the support that you'd be entitled to,
18:42which is rehab and medical attention.
18:49This is, to me, an arguable totem of systemic failure on multiple levels.
18:56It's fragility as well, because it has to lean against the wall.
18:59And when you join the army, you're not allowed to lean against the wall.
19:01You're not allowed to have your hands in your pockets or cross your arms.
19:03But this one has to lean against the wall because it will topple and it's kind of defiantly doing so.
19:11How did that stack of paperwork become an artwork?
19:15I've just been keeping all of this paperwork from Andrew.
19:17And I was trying to discern what to keep and treasure for Imogen and what I really needed to release into a more positive and more powerful way of being and to kind of shed it from us.
19:31The conversation around veteran suicide finally gained national attention.
19:38And in July 2021, a Royal Commission was launched.
19:43Royal Commission into Defence and Veteran Suicide is now in session.
19:47Please be seated.
19:49Nearly 6,000 submissions were made, including cat rays, in an effort to find out how our nation had failed our vets.
19:57Defence has been really disappointing. They've still played the old game of cover-up, nothing to see here.
20:02It is them that needs to change.
20:08The Napier Wall of R Prize, which is for people who have served or are currently serving.
20:15You won it for this work. It was in Parliament House.
20:20And this stopped our politicians in their tracks.
20:24I hope it shook things up a little bit.
20:28I mean, there was parts of this artwork which originated in Parliament House and we were petitioning for help.
20:34In September 2024, the Royal Commission released its findings.
20:41They were damning.
20:43We obviously feel that this report should be a line in the sand and a call to action.
20:47You made this during the Royal Commission into Veteran Suicides.
21:05It's such a powerful object for change. Where's the future for this piece of work?
21:22Well, the Governor-General has asked for it to go to her residence.
21:27That would be amazing.
21:28I mean, I would love that to happen.
21:31I hope it comes out of here and can speak to more people and be a reminder to leaders that so many families in Australia need this change.
21:41While affected families were begging the government for action on veteran suicides, the Australian War Memorial was listening.
22:00The result was a radical idea.
22:03We're here today to announce the Sufferings of War and Service sculpture at the Australian War Memorial, which will commemorate those who have experienced or witnessed the ongoing trauma that can result from military service.
22:19There needed to be some acknowledgment of veteran suicide.
22:26There was veterans reporting that they would stand in front of a heroic monument about death on the battlefield and not feel seen at all.
22:33Alex Eaton is a renowned sculptor known for his work in marble.
22:39So this is it.
22:42That's right.
22:44It's very beautiful.
22:45For every drop shed in anguish.
22:52The work consists of 18 large marble droplets.
22:58Their luminous forms suggesting blood, sweat or tears.
23:03So it was commissioned by the mothers whose children had died by suicide or other deaths that one might say is directly attributed to them.
23:15That's absolutely correct.
23:16That's absolutely correct.
23:18The more we know, the more you can't turn a blind eye to the need within the community to feel seen.
23:25This can no longer be just swept under the carpet.
23:28This idea of loss to find out where the tragedy lies.
23:35For me, it was all about choosing a stone that had poetry written into its surface.
23:4136 tonne, eh?
23:43Yeah, it's a light load.
23:45A little light.
23:47This is beautiful Queensland marble from the traditional lands of the Wakaman people.
23:52So I was looking through the quarry and they kept showing me this beautiful white version of this.
23:57The pearl, the A grade.
23:59Perfect for the kitchen.
24:00It's like, no, no, what about that stuff up there?
24:01They're like, oh, it's big red.
24:02You don't want that.
24:03I'm like, that's exactly what I want.
24:06I want these that have the scars in them.
24:11Red iron scars become blood-like.
24:15And I think that sort of speaks to those injuries seen and unseen.
24:18And it's the idea that hopefully there's a sense of resilience to them, too, when you put your hands upon them.
24:29I'm struck by how they could make the intangible pain of grieving families tangible.
24:37And yet somehow feeling them brings a sense of calm.
24:41In these last years since this work has been open, there's been many tributes left around the work.
24:51When the community takes ownership of an artwork, it changes the nature of the work.
24:56And it becomes not just a place, it becomes a site.
24:59It becomes a site specifically to hold those memories.
25:04Now I'd like to show you some of the tributes that have been left around the work.
25:07Notes, medals, photographs, flowers.
25:12Let's have a look.
25:13Yeah.
25:24I've got a photograph.
25:27As a mother of a boy that age, I just, I can't actually, like...
25:32Yeah.
25:34Yeah.
25:35Every day my tears are silent and invisible.
25:45Some days I can't hide them, some days I can't control them.
25:52Remember you said to me, don't cry mum.
25:55I can't help but cry, Daniel.
25:58We miss you every moment of every day.
26:00My God.
26:01When Australia and allied forces withdrew their troops in June 2021, many were left questioning the cost of the war.
26:18Amongst the soul searching, however, one thing was clear.
26:24The art of this war had made the invisible visible.
26:29It was a truth telling with our soldiers at the centre.
26:33And with vets themselves using art to heal, it's possibly changed the stories we tell about war forever.
26:42Is art got a role in educating and telling your stories for the broader public?
26:49Definitely. I mean, these tattoos, I suppose, because they're military, it becomes a bit of a talking point.
26:54It sort of helps sort of break the ice.
26:57I feel like the role of the war artist is to say, this is what it felt like, this is what it cost.
27:08Yeah. Art is a vehicle to tell every emotion, to get it out of you, for people to see, to share the burdens, to share whatever it is you're dealing with.
27:18I mean, I felt like that was like an unburdening on my behalf.
27:23It was like, you can have it now. This is your responsibility.
27:27Oh my God, there he is.
27:29Yeah.
27:34I really wanted it to be a call for arms for the people who could make decisions to improve things in the future.
27:42I'm just very glad that tributes are being left and it becomes meaningful for them.
27:48I think that's all art can really do, is provide permission to feel a certain way, to say it's okay, it's part of your experience.
28:01Yeah.
28:18Next time, there was a very big story to tell here.
28:32I find something hidden amongst the nation's war machines to come up with that.
28:38In the squalor of a prison camp.
28:40That reveals a story of prisoner of war survival I could never have imagined.
28:45We forget that this is what art can do.
Be the first to comment
Add your comment