Imagine. Reflections on peace musée international avenue de la paix 17 de la croix-rouge ch-1202 Genève et du croissant-rouge +41 22 748 95 11 2. From 16 September 2020 to 10 January 2021, the International Museum of the Red Cross and Red Crescent and the VII Foundation present "Imagine. Reflections on peace", an exhibition of photographs that reflect on peace-building processes and their everyday reality. What does peace look like, how does it really feel to live it? VII Foundation The exhibition, developed in collaboration with the , invites us to imagine an ideal peace that exists outside the headlines. What form – or forms – does peace take in everyday life in places where combatants have laid down arms after years of conflict? Some of the world’s leading photojournalists set out to explore this question by returning to the places where they carried outDon their McCullin first assignments, sometimesBeirut more than 20 years ago. Nichole Sobecki • gives us a glimpse of in the grip of civil war, while takes us back to the city’s streetsRoland as Neveuit attempts to heal despite the scars left by conflictPhnom – a journey Penh made all the more relevant byGary recent Knight events. • witnessed the Khmer Rouge takeover of in 1975. Forty-five years later, ’s photographsRon Haviv show Cambodians still grapplingBosnia-Herzegovina with the conflict’s aftermath. • coveredGilles thePeress civil warStephen in Ferry and later returned to reportNorthern on the situation Ireland there today. Colombia • Reporting by and sheds light on the peace process in two decades after the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, and in , where the 2016 peace deal remains little more than a promise. The culmination of an ambitious book project VII Foundation’ Imagine: Reflections on Peace The idea for this exhibition was sparked by the s ambitious project to stimulate dialogue about peace- building and ending conflict in the world. That project led to the book , which brings together a selection of powerful photographs as well as essays by journalists, photographers, scholars, peace-builders and civilians, each of whom provide a unique and fascinating perspective on the history – or histories – of peace from their respective viewpoints. Each text also offers an apt account of the singular way in which societies and individuals begin to heal after living through acts of extreme brutality. It was the book’s expansive, rich and multi-layered content that inspired this exhibition. Bringing such compelling ideas to life required a considerable amount of curatorial work, not only in terms of selecting the images but also deciding how they should be displayedSandra in Sunier, the exhibition space. Gary Knight According to co-curator of the exhibition alongside , difficult choices had to be made when choosing which photographs to include: “From a broad and wide-ranging corpus of images, we chose those that were most representative of the peace process and its disruptive impact on civilians. The photos are intended to be read in sequence like the chapters in a book, each one shedding light on an aspect that has often been neglected in accounts of the events they portray, with each photo revealing something of their true complexity. The meaning of these images lies not so much in what they show, but in the realities to which they refer. Their apparent banality is all the more damning.” Titre document Croissant-Rouge du et Croix-Rouge la de international Musée Imagine. Reflections on peace 3. How to depict a process as fragile as peace? Most of the photographs, removed from the searing context in which they were taken, examine stories of success and failure, and how younger generations can learn from the past while working together to build a better future. Whether portraits of victims photographed next to their aggressors or images of emotional reunions, street demonstrations and public memorials, these images – some of which are displayed in dense clusters – tell us about people: what drives them and what has damaged them. Viewed without the sense of the immediacy that is typical of trauma photography, these images invite interpretation. By portraying various facets of war’s aftermath, they reveal surprising links between peace and conflict. Creative exhibition design in the time of COVID-19 Putting together an exhibition during a pandemic is far from easy, and doing so required flexibility, adaptability and inge- nuity. The exhibit design was influenced by the constraints of the current situation as well as the RaphaèleMuseum’s Gygidedication to environmental responsibility, and the result is as powerful as it is imaginative. Exhibits were crafted using 90% recycled materials from our previous exhibition. The design by captures the fragility of reconstruction after a prolonged conflict: recycled picture rails reveal exposed joints, and former partition walls have been repurposed as seating. Only some of the photographs are framed – others simply hang from rails gleaned Pascalfrom older, Hufschmid dismantled displays. Every element was inspired by the unfinished nature of peace-building processes. , MuseumImagine. Director, Reflections on the on challenges peace of the last few months: VII Foundation “The exhibition was initially set to open in mid-May but was stopped in its tracks by the health crisis. Lockdown measures in Geneva and New York – where the , our partner organization, is based – made the final phase of production extremely challenging. Making and framing the prints, not to mention transatlantic shipping, were suddenly an obstacle. But our partners and the Museum’s staff, drawing inspiration from the stories of courage and resilience at the heart of this exhibition, made a collective decision not to give up. We had to find solutions to a number of unexpected problems: to make up for the framers’ delays owing to the lockdown, for example, we came up with a display system using old picture rails. And so, with a little flexibility, we were able to make the most of an unprecedented situation, and we are very excited to share the results with the public.” A combination of photography, installations and film The photographs – some displayed in dense clusters – occupy a series of partitions that underscore their message in the centre of the exhibition space. The density of the display reveals the many facets of each story, history and interpretation. These images document the complexity of conflict and an ideal peace that is all too often a far cry from the reality on the ground. Théâtre Spirale Imagine: Reflections on peace Audio installations by resonate with the images and provide a soundtrack to the stories being told. Pas- sages from interviews drawn from the book are narrated by eight actors who give voice to the events depicted on paper. “The Story of Two Wolves” On the outer walls, a series of quotations from the Native American legend serves to frame the visitors’ experience and guide introspection on the exhibitionVII Foundation content. Elvis Ron Haviv And in a poignant conclusion, twoformer films Yugoslavia produced by the highlight the difficulties encounteredBeyond theon the Swamp road to peace. is the story ofJack one Picone man’s fight for survival. It features Elvis Garibovic, whom photographed in 1992 at Trnopolje camp in the . Twenty-seven years later, the two men meet again. follows war photographer who, in 1994, captured devastating images of the country – images that remained burned in his mind. A generation later, he is surprised by the extraordinary progress made in Rwanda, even as its people struggle with the need to put their feelings aside so that the nation can move forward together. Titre document Croissant-Rouge du et Croix-Rouge la de international Musée Imagine. Reflections on peace 4. Nobel Peace Prize Nobel Peace Prize Henry Dunant Frédéric Passy The medal commemorating the first-ever is on public display for the first time since 2011 as part of the exhibition. It was awarded in 1901 to , co-founder of the International Red Cross, and , a French politician. Their tireless efforts to bring peace to the world led to theNobel creation Peace of Prizethe League of Nations and then the United Nations. The medal’s inclusion is intended to inspire reflection, not reverence. The is often awarded before the recipient’s actions have stood the test of time. And yet as the photographs in the exhibition show, successful peacebuilding is not a straightforward process – its success lies in its longevity. No symbolic gesture – however beautiful it may be – can fully reflect the complex reality on the ground. Visitors’ voices We love hearing from our visitors and encouraging them to get involved. The Museum has therefore created two participatory spaces where visitors can express themselves. They will receive a pamphlet at the Museum entrance with questions about the meaning of peace and what it represents for them. They are then invited to share their impressions and reflections on a wall at the end of their visit. Wish Tree Yoko Ono When the Museum reopened on 9 June, we wanted to welcome visitors back with a work that symbolisesImagine. andReflections spreads hope.on Peace.And what better symbol than a magnificent olive tree? by has therefore taken root in the Museum atrium as part of its world tour; the installation is also an apt companion piece to the exhibition VisitorsJohn Lennonare invited to imagine the future and hang their wishes from the tree’s branches. All wishes are sent back to the artist to be stored in her IMAGINE PEACE TOWER, a 2007 installation in Reykjavik, Iceland, created in memory of her late husband, . Behind the photos In the following section, the photographersImagine: Reflections featured in on the Peace exhibition write aboutVII their Foundation work habits and and Hemeria photography practice and reflect on the events they witnessed and their CHFconsequences.