Brittany Chmielewski
Afghanistan
War reporting in Western media focuses on British and American troop deaths, whereas Afghan civilian deaths are largely unreported. The media discards relevant information, deciding what is important for the public to receive. Statistics dominate war reporting, yet one type of data triumphs them all: a name. A name is personal, a name has a family, a name represents a unique existence. This piece aims to draw attention to those lost lives.
The simplicity of the construction, and the naivety of the style, reflect the lives of the fallen, their names uniquely etched by hand in cold regular letters on the background of their nation. Photographs are reproducible; hand-drawn visual representation is unique. So was each life named here. With just under a thousand Afghan civilian names before you – a small fraction of the total number – I hope it offers a moment for thought, however brief.
Tags: Brittany Chmielewski, Cambridge School of Art, Documentary, Photography, Text, War
This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 24th, 2011 at 9:07 pm and is filed under Photography. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
May 25th, 2011 at 4:25 pm
I am intrigued, it is so refreshing to see someone taking an intrest in a topic that is so raw and still very fresh in our minds. Well done you.
May 26th, 2011 at 4:59 pm
It’s interesting to see a different point of view to what the media dictates to the general public, and displayed in such a unique way.
May 26th, 2011 at 6:22 pm
You have really taken the time to understand the real truth which is shielded from us and have opened our eyes to the information which we should all be conscious of. Great work Brittany!
June 1st, 2011 at 7:30 pm
I find the graphical representation of the deaths of individuals in Afghanistan which have been transformed into a unqiue piece of artwork to be extremely emotive.