All that fall: Sacrifice, life and loss in the First World War is a portrait in itself of mourning and sacrifice on the Australian home front, told through contemporary and historical works including video, photography, soundscape and installations.

Canberra artist Lee Grant, who has a series of three large-scale landscape photographs in the show, said she was initially thrilled at the prospect of creating a work for the gallery.

As a portrait photographer from a military family, she already had several ideas related to the centenary, but had to rethink when she realised the gallery wanted something entirely different.

"I was disappointed, I have to be really honest….It was slightly ironic that the Portrait Gallery had commissioned a portrait photographer to do these landscapes," she said.

"I was a little freaked out about it, but then the way [curator] Chris [Chapman] explained it, it was the idea of portraits of absence."

Although her initial brief involved photographing war memorials in regional towns, she was more taken by the wide-open landscape in the Monaro region near Cooma.

"I think everyone's got their own ideas and their own sensibilities about what it means to be Australian, and how they tap into that whole Anzac mythology as well," Grant said.

"We've been raised in it, and a lot of Australians have connections to the world wars and more recent conflicts as well, and I think there was that idea of just triggering people's own emotions…I just felt in a way the landscape is simple, but it's complicated, if that makes sense."

Co-curator Chris Chapman said it had been a challenge to come up with an exhibition concept that wouldn't overlap with those of other institutions.

"The exhibition is, in a very direct way, a reflection on absence – it's about those who went away, soldiers, and who didn't come back. And we've tried to create an atmosphere that will allow people to reflect on the impact of that absence and that loss," he said.

"I think every element of the show prompts us to reflect on our own feelings about how we would react if we were in this situation, and what it might have possibly felt like for Australians who lived through the First World War."

The gallery has also compiled a book of essays to accompany the show, exploring themes of sacrifice and loss, by Melbourne academic Pat Jalland, philosopher Raymond Gaita, and co-curators Chapman and Anne Sanders.

All that fall: Sacrifice, life and loss in the First World War is showing at the National Portrait Gallery until July 26.