Topographies de la guerre — Le BAL — Exhibition — Slash Paris

Past: September 16 → December 18, 2011

Topographies de la guerre Célébrer le premier anniversaire du Bal sous le signe de la guerre est un acte fondateur fort. Topographies de la guerre, en engage... 3 - Bravo Critique

Can we imagine anything other than battle to represent war? Topographies of War does exactly that, by looking at war solely through its scenery. The photographs and videos in this exhibition have in common a clear and stated documentary purpose: a perspective of complete disembodiment which, as a consequence, focuses on sites, positions and geological spaces. We might call them topographical essays which, without denying the human cost of combat, choose to look at war through its geography. All these images, taken since 2000, leave bodies, casualties, injuries and death outside the frame. Only the landscape remains.

In terms of military strategy, these iconographic choices coincide with the increased use of simulation techniques and the spread of remote weaponry, but also with military authorities’ media censorship and the virtual impossibility for photographers and video-makers to operate freely on the ground. Is the territory of war becoming an abstract concept, an ideological construction, a concept that cannot be represented?