AN ARTIST IN VIETNAM

Spec/5 George C. Clark in autumn 1969    Photograph

BY THE TIME I WAS DRAFTED I HAD ALREADY PUT IN A COUPLE OF YEARS AS AN ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR IN A CHICAGO AD AGENCY, AND HAND LETTERING WAS ONE OF THE THINGS I WAS GOOD AT.  AT THE TIME THIS 8 X 8 FOOT SIGN WAS THE LARGEST PAINTING I HAD EVER MADE.

INCIDENTALLY, NO ONE EVER CALLED BRAVO BATTERY "CAMP MARTIN."  I HAD BEEN STATIONED THERE OVER NINE MONTHS AND HAD NEVER HEARD THAT NAME UNTIL THE BATTERY COMMANDER ASKED ME TO PAINT IT ON THIS SIGN.

Comment:

At the left of this photo is our mess hall, the only above-ground structure in our compound.  The structures you see beyond it are blast walls, tin roofs and the several feet of layered sandbags that topped the bunkers we worked and slept in.  The actual bunkers were mostly underground.  

PHANTOMS IN CLOSE SUPPORT

Phantoms in Close Support, unique 13.5 x 9 inch silkscreen print from an ink drawing hand colored with watercolor and gouache by George C. Clark    U.S. Air Force Art Collection

Comment:

I did the black-and-white ink drawing for this piece to use as poster and announcement art for the first two showings of A Year in the Tropics because color printing was too expensive in 1987.  Then I made a silkscreen print of it on archival watercolor board and hand colored it with watercolor and gouache.  The color version is now in the U.S. Air Force Art Collection.  

I have exercised a bit of artistic license in this painting.  I did see our aircraft rocketing targets, but not from as close up as it looks here.  And there were Khmer ruins about (I was only a 175mm projectile's throw from Cambodia, after all), but I never saw any of them personally.  I have since done archaeology in southern Illinois and Yorkshire, but I didn't have a chance to check out any ruins in Vietnam.  I spent over 95% of the thirteen months I was there literally underground in bunkers.  

THE WORKHORSE

The Workhorse, 26 x 40 inch acrylic on canvas painting by George C. Clark    U.S. Air Force Art Collection

BECAUSE THE ROADS WERE UNSAFE, EVERYTHING WE NEEDED AT BRAVO BATTERY WAS FLOWN IN.  THE C-130 WAS THE WORKHORSE OF AIR TRANSPORT IN VIETNAM.  IT BROUGHT THE PROJECTILES AND POWDER CHARGES FOR OUR BIG GUNS, AND NEW TUBES (BARRELS) FOR OUR 175MM CANNONS, WHICH HAD TO BE REPLACED EACH TIME THEY HAD FIRED 300 CHARGE 3 ROUNDS.  AN OTHERWISE EMPTY C-130 COULD TAKE OFF CARRYING A TUBE FROM THE 2 MILE LONG RUNWAY AT BIEN HOA AND LAND AT SONG BE, BUT THE RUNWAY AT SONG BE WAS TOO SHORT TO TAKE OFF WITH A SPENT TUBE FOR RECYCLING, SO WE DUMPED THE SPENT TUBES OUT ALONG THE RUNWAY.  I USED TO WONDER IF THEY WERE STILL THERE, BUT I'M SURE THE VIETNAMESE HAVE LONG SINCE RECYCLED ALL THOSE TONS OF HIGH-GRADE STEEL.

Comment:

I researched this painting when I flew in this plane from Chicago to Rhein-Main Air Base in Germany with an Illinois Air National Guard unit in the 1980s as a guest of the Air Force Art Program.   It is a really long flight from Chicago to Germany at about 200 miles per hour.  On the way over we stopped to refuel at St. Johns, Newfoundland and Mildenhall RAF in England, and on the way back at Keflavyk, Iceland and Goose Bay, Labrador.  The same planes built in the 1950s that I had flown on in Vietnam were still in service.  For this painting I showed the plane as it would have looked in 1969 with Vietnam-era camouflage and the tail number of a C-130 I had photographed at Song Be Airstrip. 

OLD PLANTATION HOUSE

Old Plantation House, 10 x 14 inch watercolor painting by George C. Clark    Collection of the Artist

 IF YOU STOOD ON THE BERM (DEFENSIVE EARTHWORK) AROUND BRAVO BATTERY'S COMPOUND, YOU COULD SEE THIS BUILDING A LITTLE OVER A KILOMETER AWAY DOWN THE ROAD TOWARD PHUOC BINH.  BEFORE THE WAR, THE HIGHLANDS AROUND HERE HAD ALL BEEN RUBBER PLANTATIONS.  NOW WHEN SHELLS EXPLODED IN THE FOREST THE TREES BLED LATEX THAT NO ONE HARVESTED.

Comment:

This is one of the first Vietnam paintings I did, for the 1985 exhibition at Skokie Public Library.

CAMBODIAN MERCENARIES

Cambodian Mercenaries, 10 x 6 inch  ink and watercolor painting by George C. Clark    Collection of the Artist

I HAD ONLY BEEN IN COUNTRY A SHORT TIME WHEN A COUPLE HUNDRED OF THESE CAMBODIAN MERCENARIES LED BY AMERICAN "SPOOKS" IN UNMARKED UNIFORMS CAMPED OUT OVERNIGHT ACROSS THE AIRSTRIP FROM US.  WE WERE NEVER TOLD WHERE THEY WENT OR WHAT THEIR MISSION WAS, BUT A WEEK LATER THEIR CASUALTIES CAME BACK SLUNG UNDER HELICOPTERS IN CARGO NETS.  THOSE WERE THE FIRST DEAD BODIES I SAW IN VIETNAM.

Comment:

One of the American "spooks" visited the fire direction center and had coffee with us.  When someone asked him where they were heading, he replied (I swear this is true and the first time I ever heard this line), "I could tell you, but then I'd have to kill you."  Is it possible that was an actual C.I.A. joke before it became a TV sitcom joke?

BAR

Bar, 10 x 8 inch ink and colored pencil painting by George C. Clark    National Veterans Art Museum Collection

Comment:

I saw bars like this in Saigon, but I didn't spend much time in Saigon because the few times I was there I was on my way to more interesting places, like Hong Kong, Singapore, and home.

"Sneaky Pete's," the club at the Special Forces compound in Phuoc Binh, had a pretty Vietnamese bartender, but there was no hanky-panky there because the Special Forces guys were very protective of her and she never hesitated to put down any G.I.'s rude suggestion with an insult comic-style rejoinder.

At Bravo Battery, we had an enlisted men's club and an officer's/NCO club where sodapop and open cans of beer could be had for 50 cents.  The clubs were open for a couple of hours most evenings.  Since the two fire direction crews rotated ten hour shifts around the clock (so that everyone got to work both day and night shifts), it was rare for us to be coming off duty when the club was open.  There wasn't supposed to be liquor outside the clubs, but booze was sold at the post exchange at Long Binh where our service battery was located, and where all of us visited from time to time en route to R&Rs and other business.  Once when a soldier reported a camera stolen our battery commander made a surprise inspection of everyone's footlockers.  I was on duty in the fire direction center when it happened.  He couldn't have missed the fifth of Seagram's VO I had in mine, but nothing was ever said about it.

THE YELLOW SUBMARINE

The Yellow Submarine, 12 x 24 inch ink and watercolor painting by George C. Clark   Private Collection

A COUPLE OF NIGHTS EACH WEEK, IF WE WEREN'T ON ALERT OR ENGAGED IN A FIRE MISSION, THEY SHOWED MOVIES AFTER SUPPER IN THE MESS HALL AT BRAVO BATTERY.  MY CREW WAS WORKING IN THE FIRE DIRECTION CENTER THE NIGHT THEY SHOWED THE BEATLES' THE YELLOW SUBMARINE AND WE DIDN'T GET OFF DUTY UNTIL 10 O'CLOCK, AFTER THE FILM WAS OVER.  WE TALKED THE PROJECTIONIST INTO SHOWING THE MOVIE AGAIN IN OUR SLEEPING HOOCH.  THE BUNKER WE LIVED IN WAS A LONG UNDERGROUND TRENCH THE WIDTH OF A BULLDOZER BLADE, LINED WITH TIMBER AND ROOFED OVER WITH HEAVY BEAMS SUPPORTING SEVERAL FEET OF LAYERED SANDBAGS.  ABOVE THE SANDBAGS WAS A TIN ROOF TO DEFLECT RAIN AND TO SET OFF INCOMING ROUNDS BEFORE THEY HIT THE SANDBAGS WHERE THEY WOULD DO MORE DAMAGE.  STANDARD DOUBLE DECKED ARMY BUNKS LINED BOTH SIDE WALLS, LEAVING A CENTRAL PASSAGE ABOUT 4 FEET WIDE.  BOTH FIRE DIRECTION CREWS SHARED THE HOOCH, WORKING 10 HOUR SHIFTS AROUND THE CLOCK, SO THERE WERE USUALLY GUYS SLEEPING THERE EXCEPT AROUND SHIFT CHANGE TIME.  THE MOSQUITO NETTING ON THE BUNKS WAS FOR PROTECTION AS MUCH FROM RATS AS FROM INSECTS.