Poignant, funny and confronting original artwork

A suite of poignant, funny and, sometimes, confronting original artworks have gone on show at Parliament House in the latest Napier Waller Art Prize show.

The exhibition of 17 highly commended works will be on show, while a further 12 of the total 29 shortlisted entries can be found here.

Supported by the Australian War Memorial and held biennially, the prize is open to current and former Australian Defence Force personnel.

A panel of judges, including Bree Pickering, director of the National Portrait Gallery of Australia; Penelope Grist, acting director, Art Collections, Parliament House and former official war artist and Laura Webster, head of art, at the war memorial, will select the winning work, to be announced on October 13.

The winning artist will receive a $15,000 cash prize and the prize-winning entry will be accepted into the memorial’s national collection.

The competition, named after Napier Waller, the artisan-veteran who created the stained glass for the Hall of Memory at the War Memorial, aims to promote artistic excellence among Australia’s service personnel, while encouraging them to record their experiences.

The diversity among the highly commended works can be seen in three sample entries from those hung in the exhibition.

In Gary Ramage’s photograph, Merle, Navy veteran Merle Hare, 103 years old, is pictured at home in Braddon. During World War II she served at HMAS Cerberus near Melbourne, but her twin brother Don, a flight engineer on a Catalina flying boat laying mines in the South China Sea, was killed in the war.

Greg Scott’s more light-hearted Swimex, acrylic paint on reused canvas, recalls a moment in June 2002, en route to the Persian Gulf when the skipper called for a Swimex. A pipe echoed throughout the ship, “Hands to bathe… the HMAS Melbourne pool is now open on the port side” and Scott joined in.

Sean Halfpenny’s touching Gentle Soldier, acrylic on canvas, is based on a photo he took on patrol in Tarin Kowt, Afghanistan, in 2010. Introduced to painting during treatment for PTSD, he says he finds this image of the soldier helping the kids “symbolic and relatable to my healing journey”.

All shortlisted artists are eligible for the People’s Choice Award, which has a cash prize of $5000.

Napier Waller Art Prize 2024, Australian Parliament House until October 13.