Bushmaster

Portraiture for Ben Quilty can be metaphorical, often taking a vehicle as its subject. In his early work the iconic Holden Torana was a symbol of his wasted youth and his rebellious, irresponsible lifestyle. Often Quilty and his mates used their Toranas in testosterone-fuelled acts of high-risk stupidity that might have resulted in a wrecked vehicle and injury or death.(1) By contrast, in Afghanistan Quilty witnessed the destruction that could be wrought on a Bushmaster armoured vehicle specifically designed to safely transport passengers in one of the most dangerous places in the world.

In Quilty's portrait 'Bushmaster' (2012), the destroyed vehicle reflects the soldiers' identity and is a vestige of their physical experience. They risk their lives while carrying out their duties in these versatile military vehicles.
"I met a young man who'd been in the back of a Bushmaster that had blown up. The Bushmaster is the big armoured four-wheel drive vehicle that's saving a lot of Australian lives, but even so the explosion caused every single young man inside that vehicle to suffer from concussion and one of them was blown out of the gun turret and landed in front of the vehicle among possibly more hidden explosive devices."(2)

The notion of mortality is present in this work: the Bushmaster has become a vanitas motif, a reminder of the transience of life and the dangerous nature of the Australian deployment in Afghanistan. The idea of mortality, and its effect on the psyche, is something Quilty has been interested in for a long time. His use of skulls, cars, even the portraits of his own children, constitutes a visual means to grapple with the idea of his own mortality. Being in Afghanistan, even for a short period of time, forced Quilty to accept that death is a possibility for all in a conflict zone: 'Nothing is safe in Afghanistan ... I decided [that] if my number was up, so be it.'(3) War brings us constant reminders of death, and people serving in these areas must find ways of dealing with the concept of their own mortality.

(1) Lisa Slade, "Ben Quilty: we are history", in Lisa Slade, 'Ben Quilty live!', Brisbane, University of Queensland Art Museum, 2009, p. 14
(2) Ben Quilty, Australian Story ABC TV interview, Tape 4, p . 4, 28 June 2012
(3) Ben Quilty, quoted in Janet Hawley, "Tour of duty", Good Weekend, Sydney Morning Herald, 4 February 2012, p. 14


Donated through the Australian Government's Cultural Gifts Program by Ben Quilty in 2013