Between Light and Dark

As part of being exhibited for the inaugural Napier Waller Art Prize exhibition (2018), Lombardo provided the following artist statement about her work:

"I joined the Army Reserves in 2002 and still serve today. Six years after I returned from a 2009 deployment, I was diagnosed with PTSD and sent to the AARTS Course in Canberra in 2016. Here, I was put in the stream for creative writing, but was attracted to the work being done by those in the visual arts stream. I returned to Perth and learnt about the Military Arts Program. I joined up, having found a new avenue to express both my grief and happiness: through art.

"I’ve since started a photography business, adapting my skills learnt as the army field photographer on deployment, for a personal life outside the Army. I now create crafts and paint in many different forms and mediums.

"My submitted pieces are an expression of my own dealings with PTSD, anxiety, depression, and personal confusion associated with all such struggles. They are not self-portraits of my own face, but rather I have used the faces of other soldiers I’ve met enduring the same struggles, and incorporated my own feelings, into a corroborated painting about all of us." (Ally Lombardo, 2018)

'Between Light and Dark' by artist and and current servicewoman Ally Lombardo was judged highly commended as part of the Memorial's 2018 Napier Waller Art Prize. Presented in partnership with Thales Australia, the University of Canberra and The Road Home, the Napier Waller Art Prize aims to promote artistic excellence, the healing potential of art for military personnel, and raise a broader awareness of the impact of service on the individual. In its inaugural year, the Napier Waller Art Prize attracted over 100 entries.