Australian War Memorial

The War Memorial is an amazine shrine-cum-museum that really needs several days' worth of visits to see everything. 

I started off with a tour - which was amazingly good value (free for a 90 minute tour). We started with the eternal flame

As you can see, there is a wreath laying service every day where the history of one of the Australians who died in war is read out and a wreath laid in his or her honour. The galleries on the right and left of the photograph are where the lists of the dead are on long plaques on the walls. At night time the names of some of those from the lists are lit up on the front of the war memorial. Details can be found in advance online about whose names will be listed and at what time and apparently families make round trips at 3.30 at night, etc, to see the name of their family members appear. There are family research areas and volunteers throughout to help you find out more about a family member.

I was of course most interested in the First World War galleries, which were extensive and focused mainly on Gallipoli. Here is one of the landing boats from this campaign (you can see the bullet holes).

However, the galleries dedicated to the second world war and later wars were also very impressive, with light and sound shows in the aeroplane areas. For a completely free museum the amount of information and interactive displays was excellent. The only thing I found irritating was the guide's perpetual reference to the English - as in English forces, the English Victoria Cross, supporting the English. Speaking as someone who researches the Scottish contribution to the First World War, I had the urge to bark 'British' at him in correction. I kept reminding myself that he was a volunteer and shouldn't be snapped at.

Only a fraction of the museum's holdings were on display - there are 30,000 pieces of art in storage for example - although they do rotate what is in the galleries regularly apparently.

Fiona, much of your father-in-law's works were accessible only online - and I am sure that you will have seen that already, but I did find the following painting displayed:

It is also from the War Memorial that one gets a superb view across Canberra, and can really appreciate how planned the city is. There is a direct line from the memorial, down a road of remembrance with many smaller memorials for individual wars and armies, across the lake, to the old Parliament buildings (the white buildings) and then the new Parliament with his flagpole at the opposite end of the city.