Hard stories

From the exhibition Post-War: Thousand Mile Stare, ANCA Gallery, Canberra. April 2015. 
My research for this project has involved a lot of reading from many sources including digitised newspapers. Trove is an incredible resource for a project like this.  I maintain a special database to help me keep track of certain information about block histories. This has been particularly useful when working on settlements such as Red Cliffs. I have recently been spending more time focusing on this part of the project which means a lot of data entry. Now that I have a deeper pool of curated information I am finding that I can explore anecdotal stories more effectively.
​Trove is particularly useful for this, some suicides were often kept very quiet within communities but I have found several reports from inquests in newspapers which provide insight into some of these deaths. I recently uncovered an article in The Age about the inquest into the death of a soldier settler at Red Cliffs which stated that he had shot himself through the head with a rifle. Previously the information I had, only indicated an accidental death. 
Image: 'A Thousand Miles' acrylic, ink, on kozo. 78 x 96.5 cm. © 2015 Katy Mutton, All Rights Reserved. From the exhibition Post-War: Thousand Mile Stare, ANCA Gallery, Canberra. April 2015.