Grip it and Grin – A Slap in the Face
It can be said that the reputation of Army PR was built on or knocked down by the use of “grip and grin” photos.
How do you defend that?
It can be suggested that the need for output and lack of ‘real’ stories led to a perception of that’s all we did.
The reason I mention this here is because of an Australian War Memorial publication on “Photographs and the modern experience of war”.
http://www.awm.gov.au/publications/contact/photographers/
In the last two paragraphs it mentions the work of avid photographer, Colonel Andy Mattay – particularly while he was a company commander in Vietnam.
The damning quote being “These photographs were intended as a response to the “quip (sic) and grin” work of public relations photographers”.
There you have it for all the world to see. Several of our members would have known COL Mattay personally – further detail on him is here:
http://www.awm.gov.au/publications/contact/andrew-mattay.asp
The aim of me mentioning this here is to encourage comment, so, please, don’t be shy 🙂
I had the great pleasure of working with the late Colonel Mattay in the early 1990s for two years when he was Commander 6MD and I was his SO3 PR. He was a great supporter of Army PR and what we were trying to achieve in Tasmania (and more broadley whenever DGPA (Brig D’Hage) called me back to Canberra for various things. RSM Buckley will recall our efforts in setting up a darkroom at 6MD, fully supported by Colonel Mattay. On a personal level, he became a great friend and he and his wife all but adopted my “newly-arrived- in-Australia-wife” while I was deployed to Cambodia for a year. RIP Colonel Mattay. A great bloke! Lest We Forget.
I had the great pleasure of meeting Andy in Tasmania in 2002 or 2003 and seeing him not long before his passing in 2004 when she showed my husband and I many moving photographs from his long and distinguished career and from his mountaineering exploits. Vale COL Mattay.
Our Official History is a smattering of personal experiences and engagements with personalities long since passed. As we face down the threats of modernising the Corps in a world of ‘no more resources’ I am personally interested in our history as it may show us the way forward. Certainly, just about every part of the Army organisation wants to be engaged with the professional arm of Public Affairs, namely members of the AAPRS. The legacy left by COL Mattay and LTCOL Roylance is an organisation rich with operational experience and connection with the growth of development of the Australian Army. We should be proud of this history. However, we seem to have provided history for other elements of the Army to showcase their relevance and experience to the detriment of our own history.
I worked in an adjoining office to Andy Mattay at Victoria Barracks (Melbourne) on a posting to allow me to ” consider, reflect upon and adjust my behavior”, working for Col John Pilbeam. To liven up the gloom Col Pilbeam hosted occasional intimate cocktail parties in our little office complex. I was at one of these when Andy Mattay and I were sharing the misery of prostate cancer treatments and the aftermath, that he told me how, on a visit to Russia, he had visited Lenin’s tomb in red square and on the steps bent down to adjust his shoe laces and partially opened the tap on his bag – thereby pissing on Lenin’s tomb – Great Style, Great Panache!