A Trip to the National Veteran's Art Museum

The National Veteran’s Art Museum in Chicago is a modest exhibit of select works from veterans of various wars throughout US history. It offers free admission year round but runs largely on public funding and so a small donation is suggested. Though small, the works on display are extremely moving. At my time of visiting the The Things They Carried exhibit and the 100 Faces of War Experience display were the two key features on show.

The Things They Carried is based on the novel of the same name by Vietnam veteran Tim O’Brien. The book, published in 1990, is a fictionalized memoir of O’Brien’s experiences in Vietnam with Alpha Company. Blending elements of fact and fiction to create a story that represents what he considers to be the only ‘true’ account of war, one that captures the emotional and psychological reaction to violence rather than dealing in physical reality, it is highly regarded as one of the most moving works detailing the Vietnam conflict. The exhibit is designed to accompany the text by providing insights into the realities of warfare as experienced by the soldiers themselves. Consisting of photographs and artwork created by veterans it displays both the visual reality of the conflict and individual interpretations, through paintings, letters and diary entries. Whilst the images are fascinating, the artwork and diary passages provide widely varying perspectives on the nature of the war that defined a generation. With statements ranging from the political to the deeply personal, the artwork in this exhibit reveals the distorted reality that each individual man and woman lived through during their time at war.

Following this theme is the 100 Faces of War exhibit put together by artist Matt Mitchell, who painted the portraits of 95 veterans and 5 civilians involved in the war effort for the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. Each individual image is displayed with a statement from the person pictured. The statements themselves are what makes the exhibit so interesting, and also what ties it in with the theme put forward in The Things They Carried. Veterans range from being proud of their time served, to shocked and horrified by what they had done and seen others do. We see men and women proudly asserting their desire to return to battle and serve their country stood next to others who express regret for being duped into fighting for a cause they no longer believe in. We see individuals who came back from the war stronger and more confident paired with those whose lives have been destroyed by post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury. We see those who were injured physically and those who injured others. We see the dead next to the living. Walking amongst these faces one is made aware of the fact that each of these individuals experienced their very own war, and that their narrative does not necessarily reflect the historical sequence of events that defined the first decade of the 21^st century. To what extent do the facts accurately portray the ‘truth’? This is the question O’Brien tackles in his book and it is one that these two exhibits force you to consider. For those of us who have not served, can we make judgements on the actions of veterans and the politicians who masterminded the war efforts? Can we trust the judgements of those were there? To what extent are these wars really in the past? For those suffering from PTSD and other psychological conditions as a result of warfare, the reality is that they never left the desert. What about the civilians who had to live through these wars without a way out?

In the words of Army Staff Sergeant Alejo Amaris, who was injured in Iraq in 2006 and picked as a contributor to the 100 Faces exhibit, “life is 10% what happens to me, and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you...”. The exhibit shows 100 different realities, all of which are equally real and equally important. For every veteran and civilian who was touched by the Vietnam of our generation a different reality exists. We can choose to look at the facts on the ground and try to make sense of the conflicts that way, or we can try to understand the myriad reactions of each individual returning from a battle zone. In the aftermath of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the current exhibits at the National Veterans Art Museum aim to take stock of what the short and long term effects may be on individuals touched personally by combat, and how the vicarious influence on a generation raised in the shadow of America’s longest running war will shape our future in foreign policy.

Though modestly sized, the National Veterans Art Museum has a lot to offer for someone interested in the psychological impact of warfare. It is moving because of its honesty, shying away from the propaganda of war stories from the administration, other than to demonstrate that they are a part of the tapestry that makes up the experience of war. You don’t have to agree with all of the opinions put forward in the artwork on display – in fact you definitely won’t – but you should acknowledge that they exist and take the time to try to understand why that is the case.