A short presentation of the Conference EXHIBITION. By Thomas Lewe
IAMHIST is the International Association for Media and History, an organization of scholars, filmmakers, broadcasters and archivists dedicated to historical enquiry into film, radio, TV and other related media.
The conference theme this year was CONFLICT RESOLUTION AND THE MEDIA. Scholars of media history, more other than not, have looked at the role of media in times of conflict, revolution, war, crisis, social and political upheaval. Yet, media has also played a decisive role in processes of conflict resolution. As such, media in one way or another affected nation building processes, the fight for civil rights, equalities, the reconciliation of former enemies, the democratization of totalitarian states and peacekeeping missions around the world. Examples include European integration after the Cold War, the end of Apartheid in South Africa, democratization processes after military dictatorships in South America or the empowerment of minorities.
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Thomas Lewe - the exhibition:
My job as a designer was to develop the concept and the visuals for the exhibition. The IAMHIST conference was originally planned to be scheduled at Volda University College (Norway) in early 2022. Prof. Rolf Werenskjold has been initiator, administrator and coordinator for the entire conference in Volda. Due to Corona regulations, the conference was cancelled and later moved to Kiel University of Applied Sciences (Germany) where it has been coordinated by Prof. Tobias Hochscherf.
As the early adaption of the exhibition was planned to be at the Volda University College campus, the location was a given frame. My conceptual decisions were related to the idea of a room within a room - both as a practical approach of collecting the exhibition items in one focal place, but also as a metapher for the different angels in protest movements (within and outside). One challange was to make the exhibition visable and even noisy (visually) - as a reference to protest movements, but also give enough intimate space for the visitor to explore and process the elements of the exhibition. For this reason, I have designed the exhibition to be within a small room (4mx4m), so the visitor had to actively walk into that space. Yellow umbrellas (in reference to the Hongkong Umbrella Protest movement from 2014) were ment to guide the audience into this space (attached to the ceiling along the whole university building).
Inside the square room, 4 monitors were ment to present 4 different angels into protest movements: The 2020 Belarus movement (by photographer Andrei Liankevich), the Afghan Photographers Association´s images from 2021 (initiated in cooperation with Oslo Met), a huge selection of political cartoons during the cold war (researched by Prof. Rolf Werenskjold) and finally some extracts from Liz McQuistons several book publications about protest graphics. These presentations were planned to be looped, so the conference participants could enter the exhibition at any given time during the conference. Additional posters were ment to be placed at the whole campus, both showing different aspects of protest, but also referring to the content of the exhibition screens. The outside wall of the square room would show a photographical collage of different protest movements around the world (see sketch below).
BUT... since the conference in Volda was cancelled - and so was the exhibition, the main challenge was to adopt the original concept to the exhibition location in Kiel. Luckily, the campus in Kiel houses an old bunker from WW2, which now is used for on-campus cultural events. The location turned out to be the perfect frame for the protest exhibition and refugium for conference participants.
However - the original concept needed to be changed. The room inside the room concept would not make a lot of sense here. I decided to stick to the core elements of the original exhibition. The title of the conference changed from "Visuals in Protest, Terror, Conflict and War" changed to "Conflict Resolution and the Media" - most of the printed material needed to be reprinted. In order to take advantage of the rough and bigger room, larger monitors were installed and the main banner was resized accordingly.
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> The 4 exhibition screens containing:
PROCESS BELARUS
The photos were taken during the Belarusian protests of 2020, documenting courageous citizens standing up for their rights and a better future. Andrei Liankevich (1981) is a photographer from Belarus, teaching photojournalism at the European Humanity University in Vilnius. In 2012, he was among the 15 most influential artists of Belarus. Liankevich has exhibited his photographs in more than 60 galleries in Europe, Asia, and the United States. He has received international photo-awards in amongst others Belarus, Lithuania, Poland and Great Britain. He also published the photo-book «Pagan» (2010), organized the first edition of the book on young Belarus photography «BY NOW» (2013) and initiated «Month of Photography in Minsk» (2014) an annual photo festival, covering 20 cultural institutions and 25 exhibitions.
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POLITICAL CARTOONS
A brief overview of the international political years between 1975 and 1989 - a part of the last period of the Cold War - through political cartoonists' eyes. In the years after the Second World War, most major Norwegian newspapers employed permanent political cartoonists. In addition, they used foreign cartoonists to comment on daily news events and foreign policy in general. The political cartoon is part of the visual journalism and the production of meaning, covering both local and global protest, terror, conflict, and war. The political cartoon puts problems under debate, and it can be a temperature check for the conditions of freedom of expression in liberal democracies under pressure. It can also be a bearer of strongly restrictive tendencies and racism in the mass media under authoritarian regimes.
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WHERE THERE IS A WAR, THERE IS STILL LIFE
A photojournalistic exhibition created through a collaboration between the Afghan Photographers Association (APA) in Afghanistan (now in exile) and the Journalism and Media International Center (MIC) at OsloMet. Out of over 600 submitted photos, an international professional jury selected 46 photos for the exhibition. The exhibition shows 46 photos from different provinces, taken by 27 Afghan photographers. The photos show work and daily life, from sports and play; and also strong portraits. Additionally it shows what is at stake with the new Taliban's regime and a completely different social order. The exhibition opened on 25 August at OsloMet; and has been shown during October at the UN headquarters in New York, and a number of other places.
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PROTEST GRAPHICS
Liz McQuiston is an American graphic designer based in Britain (graphic art and design, Royal College of Art, London). She has published several books covering visual expressions in protests and conflicts (Graphic Agitation, Protest! A history of social and political protest graphic, Suffragettes to She-Devils, Visual Impact: Creative Dissent in the 21st Century). The lobal use of graphics for propaganda and protest is partly surveyed in this presentation - an excerpt of her book publications, featuring dissent and agitation, building on broad areas of politics and activism, ranging from "National Politics: Politcal Parties, Governments and Leaders" to "Saving the Earth: Ecology and the Green Movement'." Her collection is highlighting the timeless iconography of protest graphics.
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> Photos from the exhibition in Kiel [june 12th, 2022]
> The posters from the exhibition in Kiel:
> The original banners for the Volda exhibition:
One new element was added to the Kiel exhibition: A Monitor installation with movie clips from different political protest situations through history filled one small room next to the main exhibition room. This room needed to be entered through a dark curtain (in reference to the iron curtain), and contained sound as the only area in the entire exhibition (working as a disturbing element and at the same time as a trigger for the outside audience). See image below.
