ART

Dogs of War is an installation in the foyer of the East Gallery of a series of works by Portland artist Kay Marshall. She creates a small card for each American soldier killed in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. These beeswax-coated cards, about three by four inches, hang in chains from the ceiling, or are clipped on top of antique chess pawns symbolizing the government's use of soldiers as pawns in the inhumane game of armed conflict. One side of each card is stamped with a palm tree. Marshall covers the stamped tree trunk with a matchstick that she has lit and then blown out, just as that soldier's life was snuffed out. The opposite side of each card is stamped with one of four breeds of dogs, referencing soldiers' dog tags, dog-face soldiers, dogged fighters, and, to quote Shakespeare, "the dogs of war."

Marshall was inspired to begin this work when, on invading Iraq in 2003, the U.S. military developed a set of playing cards picturing the most wanted members of then-president Saddam Hussein's government. Marshall felt that the real "most wanted" in Iraq were the soldiers whose lives were and are being lost. The U.S. government banned media images of coffins returning dead soldiers, so this is her way of recognizing the ravages of war. Says Marshall, "I’m amazed at how little [the Iraq War] has impacted anyone I know." Her installation aims to bring home the impact of our losses.