war + peace monument and counter-monument
photography | the middle east by dick averns
war art vernacular signs peacekeeping accidental memorials
Journeying to the Middle East in the summer of 2009 as a war artist with Canadian peacekeeping troops, I made my way to the Sinai border country between Israel and Egypt. This whole region is overseen by the Multinational Force & Observers (MFO) and it was to the MFO North Camp –a former Israeli air base about ten miles from Rafah and the Gaza Strip— that I was deployed as part of a photographic and non-fiction writing project. Throughout this part of the world, signs of conflagration are evident. From the public sculptures and museums in Cairo and Tel Aviv, to the roadside memorials and struggling communities in between, the monumental effects of war are hard to miss. Monuments to nation-building are understandable, and perhaps serve to galvanise patriotism; after all, both countries discussed here still have vast conscripted militaries. But they also have a peace treaty. The war on terror may have been a death knell for liberty and traditional peacekeeping (seen as outmoded by some because protagonists need to be visible and inclined to peace) but the landscape of MFO North Camp indicates an ongoing peacekeeping vernacular. In comparing and contrasting registrations of war, ranging from official museums to the signage in an isolated peacekeeping base, the paradigm of peacekeeping is, I propose, the counter- monument to war. War monuments are often seen as harbingers of conflict. However, as ammunition is collected under amnesty conditions, peacekeeping becomes more productive than war. This is not to say peacekeeping memorials cannot claim their own monumentality, rather that counter-monuments often operate in a more abstract manner. From the monolith of the Israeli security fence to the particular spatiality of the MFO, there’s a lot to be said for amnesty ammunition. C
from the top: ‘Israeli “security fence”, Ramallah’
‘October 1973 War Panorama, Cairo’ (SAM2 missile) ‘October 1973 War Panorama, Cairo’ (surrender relief) ‘Roadside memorial sculpture,West Bank’ ‘‘Faith in God,Victory, Martyrdom’ National Military Museum, Cairo’ all photographs by Dick Averns, 2009
64 On Site review 22: WAR
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