After returning home from the Gulf War in the early 90s, Glenn Fitzpatrick decided to turn his harrowing experience into anti-war artwork. Reporter MICHAEL PURTON found out more.

WHEN 38-year-old Glenn ‘Fitzy’ Fitzpatrick’s work goes on display at a London gallery later this month, it will be the culmination of his journey from soldier to anti-war artist.

Born and raised in Gravesend, he joined the army in 1990 and left his hometown to serve his country and see the world, but nothing could have prepared him for what he would see in Iraq.

As a tank driver with a team of medics during the heart of the conflict in 1991, he was confronted with death and destruction daily and left traumatised by the experience.

He said: “Seeing dead people did not affect me, it was the ones who were alive and crying and reaching out to me.

“We would see people who had had their legs blown off - British and American soldiers, Iraqi soldiers, and people who lived in the country.”

When he returned to the UK, the former pupil of St John's Catholic Comprehensive School in Rochester Road was shell-shocked and found it difficult to talk about his feelings and reintegrate with everyday society.

So he turned to art, finding his hands could say things about the horror of the war that his mouth could not, and he studied a degree and then a masters in the subject at the University for the Creative Arts in Canterbury.

He said: “I find it much easier to express myself through art, rather than stare difficult issues straight in the face.”

Since then he has gone on to create a portfolio of artwork and an illustrated book that narrates his own experience in the war while questioning whether it, and the current conflict in Iraq, are justified.

This work includes a sculpture of a petrol pump with a knife attached, a metaphor for his belief the wars are motivated by oil.

He said: “I am not anti-war if it’s for a good cause, but you have to question why you go to war.”

The book, titled Arts and Mines, is released on January 27 and a collection of his artwork titled Symbols of Society will be part of the Art in Mind exhibition at The Brick Lane Gallery from Janaury 28 to February 8.

He says the message of the book and exhibition is that people and nations can “learn from their mistakes and make a positive change” - as he did when he came home from war.

For more information on Glenn and his work, go to fitzy593.co.uk; for details of the exhibition go to thebricklanegallery.com