Label Type
Artist CommentaryLabel
War Remnants
A 1976 calendar catches my eye: “Australian women celebrate the heroic victory of the Vietnamese people”. The note in small print states that proceeds from the sale of the calendar would go towards Vietnam’s reconstruction and an Australian women’s delegation to Vietnam in 1975. The sketches are by two Australian artists, and the Vietnamese women of their imaginations looking off in the distance.
As I look at the perfectly preserved artefact behind glass, a rush of anger passes through me. What did Australian women actually know of the Vietnamese beyond what they saw on their television screens and through filtered media reports? I had forced myself to visit the museum on 30 April, even though I knew that everything would be framed by ‘the other side’; what I didn’t expect was to be challenged by Australia’s own history.
Exactly forty years since 1976, I read "victory" at the War Remnants Museum and feel bitterness. It’s painful to be confronted with the truth that some of those I lived and worked alongside had once carelessly celebrated our demise.
