Visual Peace Research

The theme for the lecture is Visual Peace Research. This, of course, is  an impossibly wide subject that, therefore, needs to be narrowed to  manageable propositions. Also, wide and rather generic subjects can best  be explored, addressed and introduced by means of specific cases.

My  case today is Rwanda, the 1994 genocide, visual representations of the  genocide and its aftermath, and the era of the witness. My talk  contributes to the discussion on the 1994 genocide in Rwanda by  elaborating on three photography projects on the aftermath of the  killings. I engage with the literature on visual representations of  human suffering, being a witness, and trauma, and present to you the  photography of Alfredo Jaar, Robert Lyons, and Jonathan Torgovnik.

I am  looking for the conditions in which photography can succeed in  disrupting stereotypical political interpretations in connection with  the genocide. Art photography, I argue, can help transform the viewers  from consuming spectators into participant witnesses. Participant  witnesses are people who self-critically reflect upon their own subject  positions in relation to the conditions depicted in the image.

By  discussing photography of the aftermath of the genocide, I acknowledge  the unrepresentability of genocide in general and of the killings in  Rwanda in particular and also the absence of images of actual killings.  By focusing on visual representations, I respect the extent to which  political space is nowadays constituted by means of images. By  concentrating on Rwanda, I hope to contribute to the “process of  self-examination” demanded by former UN secretary-general Kofi Annan regarding the ways “we collectively remember this tragedy.”

– Frank Möller

YTI-luennoilla keskustellaan ajankohtaisten kysymysten tutkimuksellisesta jäsentämisestä. Luentosarjan järjestää Yhteiskuntatutkimuksen instituutti. Luennot ovat kaikille avoimia.

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