THE ‘A Camera on Gallipoli’ exhibition is on display at the Jervis Bay Maritime Museum and Gallery until September 30.
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The photos were taken by Sir Charles Ryan.
In 1915 soldier and surgeon Sir Charles captured the Australian experience at Gallipoli via a series of candid photographs.
“His sensitivity, empathy with those on both sides and his eye for the remarkable are apparent in his photographic work,” the exhibition description states.
These images take people behind the stirring accounts of battle being reported at home to reveal the forbidding landscape, tired troops in the trenches, squalid dug-outs, and the horrendous task of burying the dead.
The photographer captures mateship, stoicism, dogged endurance and the spirit of Anzac.
Exhibition co-ordinator Dianna Lorentz said 39 images were on display.
Ms Lorentz said the exhibition did not glorify war as some of the images are confronting.
She loves how the Australian laconic view of life and humour also comes across.
In some photos the Australians are shown wearing pants they turned into shorts by cutting off the legs.
The pants were adapted because it was so hot in Gallipoli, but the British military frowned on this uniform modification.
Another thing the photos show is how compact Anzac Cove is and how precariously the Australians were perched in its surrounds.
Ms Lorentz said even with her non-military background she could see how disadvantaged the Australians were, compared to the Turks.
There will be an educational part of the exhibition and ex-high school teacher Lloyd Pitcher, who has an interest in World War I, will be giving some talks.
There will also be a display of photos from local people who have a connection to WWI.
Meanwhile, beyond the photographs in the exhibition is the story of Charles Ryan’s remarkable life.
It encompasses his service as a doctor with the Turkish army in 1877–78, his close encounter with Ned Kelly, whom he treated at Glenrowan, his time as a leading Melbourne surgeon, his long service as a senior military officer and the high civil and military recognition extended to him by his peers.