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English sculptor Gladys Blaiberg (1882-1969)

30 August 2010 by Cherie Prosser. No comments
Of love and war, Gladys Blaiberg, Of Love and War

English sculptor Gladys Blaiberg (1882-1969) created paper sculptures of Australian troops in London during the First World War. In 1917, Blaiberg volunteered to work in the Australian Forces canteen in London where her interest in the Australian presence became a source of inspiration for her paper figures. Largely caricaturing the Australian troops, she became fascinated with their spirited sense of humour and irreverence for authority. In 1917-18, Blaiberg even exhibited the sculptures in her studio for the entertainment of the Australian troops. 

In 1971, Gladys Blaiberg’s family presented to the Memorial thirty four paper sculptures depicting Australian soldiers during the First World War. They provide a rich source of historical material relating the experience of Australian troops based in London on leave and undergoing rehabilitation. This work continues in its relevance today. 

Gladys Blaiberg’s sculptures will be included in the Memorial’s touring exhibition, Of love and war, which will open to the public at the State Library of Queensland on 4 November 2010. 

Should you have any information regarding the copyright holder for Gladys Blaiberg, please contact the Memorial by emailing; art@awm.gov.au.

Love Letter Update for Valentine’s Day

13 February 2010 by Nicholas Schmidt. 6 Comments
Collection,From the collection,News,Of love and war,Personal Stories, Exhibition, Of Love and War, People, Private Records

It has been a year since the first blog entry went up about Marthe Gylbert and her letter. In this time, with the help of some very generous people, I have been able to discover much about Marthe and her wonderful love letter. If you have not seen the previous blog entries, they can be found here and here.

Marthe‘s nephew Jean Marc Gylbert has been very helpful and interested. He has provided much information about his family and his aunt although some part of the story remains a mystery even to him. This blog is based on information Jean Marc Gylbert has provided.

Marthe Gylbert

Marthe was born on the 24th April 1901 to Louis and Marie Louise Gylbert. She was the fourth child in the family of six children, two of whom died while very young. The family came originally from Nieppe, a village about 3 km from Armentières, on the left bank of the Lys River. Jean Marc Gylbert describes the family as ‘very poor’ with Marthe’s father working as a farm labourer and her mother employed as a servant.

Marthe met her Australian sweetheart in Armentières not Saint-Sulpice-les-Feuilles as I said before in my previous update. Armentières had been briefly occupied by the Germans, in October 1914, but was taken back by the British, who occupied the village until the 10th April 1918. Amongst the troops in Armentières were Australians and this is when Marthe appears to met her ‘Darling Little Sweetheart’.

read on

Conservation Cleaning of a Wedding Dress

14 December 2009 by Jessie Firth. 4 Comments
Collection,Conservation,From the collection,Of love and war, Conservation, Dry-cleaning, Exhibition, From the collection, Of Love and War, Textile, wedding dress

Emma Jones previously mentioned in 60 year old sweat on a wedding dress – a conservation challenge the preparation of Miss Platt-Hepworth’s wedding dress for the exhibition Of Love and War. The decision was made by the curator Rebecca Britt to keep the staining as evidence of use. While the staining is important to keep, the fabric was not as lustrous as it once was. The dress has a pattern of pretty daises made from cream silk woven with numerous silver threads. A lot of the silver plating on the metal threads had tarnished and been damaged; this has exposed the copper substrate of the thread and gives the dress a more golden appearance than it originally had.

Due to the presence of the metal threads, I discounted the use of many of the cleaning methods that a textile conservator might normally use such as washing. As any treatment with water could damage the silk or cause further corrosion of the metal I decided to use a solvent to ‘dry-clean’ the dress. Petroleum spirits was my chosen solvent as it is less toxic than a lot of the other dry-cleaning solvents. My tests also indicated that the lustre and handle of the silk would be improved, while leaving the historical staining intact.

Petroleum Sprits is an unpleasant chemical to use, so to ensure our safety we used gloves and respirators. The bath was set up in a large fume extractor in the Large Technology Conservation Workshop, which is usually used to paint tanks!

When historical textiles are being treated it is important to be very gentle so as not to damage the fabric. So for this wedding dress a large bath was used to prevent creases and folds.  During ‘dry-cleaning’ the dress was very gently sponged by hand to move the solvent through the fabric without moving the fabric too much. Once rinsed with more of the solvent, the dress was lifted out of the bath on a nylon netting supporting sling and placed on a hammock (made of more netting) to dry.

The following photographs show Sarah Clayton, Senior Textile Conservator, and myself, ‘dry-cleaning’ Miss Platt-Hepworth’s wedding dress in Petroleum Spirits and the dress drying.

Sarah Clayton and Jessie Firth ‘dry-cleaning’ Miss Platt-Hepworth’s wedding dress

Miss Platt-Hepworth’s wedding dress drying after 'dry-cleaning'

This was a successful treatment; the fabric is fresher and more lustrous after cleaning, whilst the historical stains remain intact. It is now very important that we use gloves when handling this dress, to prevent the natural oils and acids from our skin tarnishing the silver threads again.

“Dorothy” the Kitbag

11 December 2009 by Bridie Kirkpatrick. 3 Comments
Collection,Conservation,Exhibitions,Of love and war, Conservation, Dorothy Lamour, Exhibition, kitbag, Of Love and War, pin-up, Sgn John Conrad Lynam, Textile

Isn’t it funny how things come about? While working on the textiles component for the exhibition Of Love and War a painted kitbag came to me for treatment. The lovely pin-up painted on the bag looked an awful lot like Dorothy Lamour, a beautiful actress known as the “Sarong Girl” in the 1940’s.  As the exhibition will be travelling I had to chuckle that Dorothy Lamour made a string of Bing Crosby/ Bob Hope “On the Road” films. The kitbag belonged to Signaller John Conrad Lynam, a timber cutter from Brisbane. Signaller John appears to have had an artistic hand and a taste for beautiful women.  The kitbag was worn and many years of use and storage had caused abrasions and losses. The paint was also flaking from the canvas, leaving the surface very unstable. The conservation challenge was to find a binding agent to stabilise the paint surface that was strong but flexible and would not discolour the paint or underlying canvas. After much testing a traditional conservation material “Isinglass” was chosen. Isinglass is made from the bladder of the Sturgeon fish and has the consistency of wall paper glue. It was applied sparingly with a small paint brush in conjunction with a wicking solvent.

Applying solvent to "Dorothy" the Kitbag

The kitbag is currently on display and Dorothy is safe to go “On the Road” again.

Wedding Dresses, Part 3

19 November 2009 by Sarah Clayton. 3 Comments
Conservation,Of love and war, Conservation, Of Love and War, preservation, Textile, wedding dress, Wedding Dresses

Once we determined that the remaining three wedding dresses, requested for the exhibtion Of Love and War, were able to be safely put on display, the textile conservators worked in collaboration with curators and exhibition staff to determine the dimensions of showcase and, the types and styles of mannequins. To get the most accurate dimensions the dresses were placed on temporary mannequins and the trains were arranged as they will fall on display.  In the picture the two wedding dresses in the foreground have undergone no conservation treatment and are on ill-fitting temporary mannequins, the wedding dress in the back is on a mannequin previously custom made for it. 

Wedding dresses for Of Love and War on temporary mannequins

As part of the process of conservation we will ensure that mannequins are custom made for all the wedding dresses and uniforms on display in Of Love and War.  This will ensure that the garments are correctly supported and shaped and that all materials used in the construction of the mannequins are of archival quality.

60 year old sweat on a wedding dress – a conservation challenge

12 November 2009 by Emma Jones. 7 Comments
Conservation,From the collection,Of love and war, Conservation, Exhibition, Love and war, Of Love and War, youtube

Back in September, I was doing some work out at our Treloar Annex, which is where our conservators work.  I was videoing the construction process of the mannequins being made for the 3 wedding dresses  that are to be included in the “Of love and war” exhibition. During a break in filming I got talking to Jessie Firth, who was working on one of the wedding dresses .  She was applying fake perspiration to material to see what effect it would have.  Picking up my trusty camera, I went down to the conservation lab and the following is an interesting account of just what 65 year old perspiration can do to a wedding dress and how conservators plan to tackle the problem it presents.  

Sweat on a 60 year old wedding dress

Wedding Dresses, part 2

11 November 2009 by Sarah Clayton. 1 Comment
Conservation,Exhibitions,Of love and war, Conservation, Exhibition, Of Love and War, preservation, Textile, Wedding Dresses

 As previously explained four wedding dresses were initially selected for “Of Love and War“. One of the wedding dresses, originally owned by Mrs N S Bissaker, required hundreds of hours of painstaking work before it would be strong enough for display, so unfortunately it will not be ready for display in “Of Love and War”.  Instead this dress with go on our Vulnerable Textiles conservation list and be conserved with all the care it deserves to preserve it for the future. In cases like this, it is the vulnerability of the dress that determined its exclusion from this exhibition. However, the Memorial plans to make images of this dress available on its website in the near future.

Detail of the front bodice of Mrs N S Bissaker wedding dress.

Detail of the upper back bodice of Mrs N S Bissaker wedding dress.

You can see in the pictures the fragile state of the lace, which has many holes visible as black areas.  For full conservation of this dress, sheer silk panels will be inserted behind each piece of the dress and then the lace will be carefully stitched to these panels, giving the dress the structural support it requires.

Celebrating a year on the Commons on Flickr

11 November 2009 by Liz Holcombe. 4 Comments
Collection,News,Of love and war, 11 November, Armistice, Exhibition, Flickr, flickr commons, Of Love and War, Remembrance Day

Officers of the 1st Australian Light Horse Brigade. B00572

One year ago today, the Australian War Memorial joined the Commons on Flickr.  We put up a set of 30 photos of soldiers, sailors, nurses, airmen, wives, mothers, sisters, sweethearts, a prime minister, and a koala. The photos are part of our photo collection of well over a million images which covers the experience of Australians at war and Australian military history from the 1860s to the present.  We have uploaded other sets on the Commons since then, each with its own theme: Christmas, children, animals, ANZAC Day, and First World War aviation.

 The 103 images have been viewed almost 180,000 times; there have been over 530 comments, 2,000 favorites, 340 tags and 830 contacts. read on

Love Letter Update

10 September 2009 by Nicholas Schmidt. 3 Comments
Collection,Exhibitions,From the collection,News, Of Love and War

PR03970 PR03970

Those who regularly read the AWM blog might remember the Valentine’s Day blog post about a mysterious love letter from a young French woman to her soldier sweetheart.

This letter, and the mystery that surrounds it, created lots of interest. With the help of an enthusiastic member of the public, and her wonderfully helpful relative in France, we have since found a few more details about Marthe and her letter.

Marthe and her family were evacuated from Armentières, on the French/Belgian border, to Saint-Sulpice-Les-Feuilles during the First World War. Armentières was destroyed during the war and rebuilt afterwards.

It was in Saint-Sulpice-Les-Feuilles that Marthe met her sweetheart. However, the identity of Marthe’s sweetheart and his fate remain a mystery. The two never married as he rejoined his battalion and never came back to her. Marthe’s nephew heard the story from his father but the family cannot recall his name after all these years. However, enquires continue and I’ll do another blog post if any more information turns up.

Marthe’s letter will be on public display as part of the Memorial’s Of Love and War exhibition opening in December.

Valentine’s Day Love Letter

13 February 2009 by Nicholas Schmidt. 13 Comments
Collection,Exhibitions,News, Of Love and War, Private Records, Valentine's Day

The Memorial recently acquired a mysterious letter. It is beautifully written and decorated, but we don’t know much about it. It seems it was written by a French woman to her sweetheart, and we assume he was Australian, as the letter ended up in Australia. We do not know who they were, but we do know that the letter was written on 25 August 1918 and was sent from Saint-Sulpice-les-Feuilles in France. The writer, Martha (or perhaps Marthe) Gylbert, obviously missed her soldier, and went to a great deal of trouble to decorate the letter. It seems that the two were engaged to be married, as the letter ends with the words (almost obscured with kisses) “wife to be very soon”.

First page of a letter written in France in 1918. PR03970