Peace and Conflict Cultural Network
Lead Research Organisation:
University of the Arts London
Department Name: London College of Communication
Abstract
The Peace and Conflict Culture Network will address the complex and contested questions that face post conflict societies, of what should we remember, what should we forget, and, ultimately, why? It will explore the role of publicly visible memory and its potential impact on issues such as reconciliation and healing in the wake of conflict, and how could and should (consciously and unconsciously) memory processes shape the present and future. These questions of memory (and forgetting) are intensely political and have far-reaching consequences and these debates are vital to institutions of cultural memory that engage with the past in order to make sense of the present and build towards a more peaceful future. The network will therefore explore how public institutions (such as museums and other heritage sites that support education/awareness) can deal with the past? What is the role if any of such institutions in transitional justice and making sense of contested pasts as a part of peacebuilding and conflict prevention?
The network will seek to facilitate connections with academics and other relevant stakeholders and mobilise arts and social institutions engaged in peace, conflict and cultural discourse in the UK and abroad in selected regions. It is an innovative network that brings together academics who work on post-conflict societies and organisations and museum practitioners in countries that have recently experienced armed conflicts or genocide. It will posit a central research question: what is the role of museums and memory sites that deal with memory and conflict, and how can they more effectively promote tolerance, resilience, inter-group and inter-ethnic cooperation? Within that question, the network will deal with a number of sub-questions, such as: What is a museum's responsibility in the formation and maintenance of cultural memory? Which strategies for public engagement work and which do not? Within these broad themes, the network will focus on several research questions in detail by exploring case studies from relevant practitioners and institutions. Firstly, it will investigate the role of art and artists in a museum/site of memory context in contributing to peacebuilding processes. Secondly, the network will facilitate discussions around the question of how youth can be engaged actively in peacebuilding through engagement with museums/sites of memory.
The network will especially foreground the contribution from academics and institutions from post conflict societies in particular from the Former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and the Great Lakes region, Lebanon and the Middle East and Colombia and Latin America. It will facilitate a series of virtual and physical workshops and seminars and two major conferences on Museums and Memory to be held in Sarajevo in 2022 and 2023.
It will support the development of several live projects between museums and other civic society actors including the Srebrenica Genocide Memorial, The Post Conflict Research Centre in Sarajevo, Bosnia Herzegovina, and the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network.
The network will seek to facilitate connections with academics and other relevant stakeholders and mobilise arts and social institutions engaged in peace, conflict and cultural discourse in the UK and abroad in selected regions. It is an innovative network that brings together academics who work on post-conflict societies and organisations and museum practitioners in countries that have recently experienced armed conflicts or genocide. It will posit a central research question: what is the role of museums and memory sites that deal with memory and conflict, and how can they more effectively promote tolerance, resilience, inter-group and inter-ethnic cooperation? Within that question, the network will deal with a number of sub-questions, such as: What is a museum's responsibility in the formation and maintenance of cultural memory? Which strategies for public engagement work and which do not? Within these broad themes, the network will focus on several research questions in detail by exploring case studies from relevant practitioners and institutions. Firstly, it will investigate the role of art and artists in a museum/site of memory context in contributing to peacebuilding processes. Secondly, the network will facilitate discussions around the question of how youth can be engaged actively in peacebuilding through engagement with museums/sites of memory.
The network will especially foreground the contribution from academics and institutions from post conflict societies in particular from the Former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and the Great Lakes region, Lebanon and the Middle East and Colombia and Latin America. It will facilitate a series of virtual and physical workshops and seminars and two major conferences on Museums and Memory to be held in Sarajevo in 2022 and 2023.
It will support the development of several live projects between museums and other civic society actors including the Srebrenica Genocide Memorial, The Post Conflict Research Centre in Sarajevo, Bosnia Herzegovina, and the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network.
| Title | Pazi Snajper/Watch Out Sniper |
| Description | "Sniper Alley" became one of the most infamous terms used in the reporting of the conflict in Bosnia Herzegovina and the Siege of Sarajevo. Its epicenter was in and around the immediate vicinity of the Historical Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The area of Zmaja od Bosne from the Museum, past the Zemajski Museum, and onto the Parliament building, was particularly vulnerable as the intersections along the wide street were overlooked from the tower blocks in Grbavica across the river Miljacka that formed the frontline in the area. This exhibition engages with the legacy of the sniper attacks on the city through a range of media, including a 3D printed scale model of the immediate vicinity of the Historical Museum, an expert witness report on sniper attacks that was used as evidence at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia, archival photographs from the war including a new multimedia piece by Paul Lowe, and works by artists reflecting on the impact snipers had on the lives of the citizens of the city. The research and production of the exhibition was supported by a grant from the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network. The exhibition was produced by the Historical Museum of Bosnia Herzegovina and curated by Paul Lowe of UAL and Elma Hodzic of the Historical Museum |
| Type Of Art | Artistic/Creative Exhibition |
| Year Produced | 2022 |
| Impact | The exhibition opened at the Historical Museum of Bosnia Herzegovina in November 2021 and then toured to The Endzio gallery in Belgrade in December 2022. The tour to Belgrade was initiated as part of the Peace and Conflict Cultural Network as an international collaboration between the Historical Museum of Bosnia Herzegovina and the Youth Initiative for Human Rights. The Belgrade exhibition was co funded by Forum ZFD and The Balkan Investigative Reporting Network and the opening was attended by Elma Hasimbegovic, director of the Historical Museum of Bosnia Herzegovina and Elma Hodzic, curator. The exhibition received extensive media coverage in Serbian media. |
| URL | https://balkaninsight.com/2022/12/14/uk-photographer-brings-images-of-sarajevos-sniper-alley-to-belg... |
| Description | As the Award is still active, our conclusions are not fully developed, however to date the network has enabled substantial an valuable interactions across the participants in the network and has built capacity around the issues we are engaging with across several institutions. |
| Exploitation Route | As the Award is still active, our conclusions are not fully developed |
| Sectors | Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
| Description | The network activities to date have enhanced interaction and knowledge exchange between museums and site of memory in BiH, UK and Lebanon. In particular, a potential intra-institutional strategic collaboration is being formulated between the Imperial War Museum and the History Museum of Bosnia Herzegovinia. This has already begun with a field visit by James Bulgin, head of Public History at the IWM to the History Museum in Sarajevo, during which he advised the museum on their plans for the new curation of their Besieged Sarajevo permanent exhibition. This will be followed up by a visit by the Museum's direct to the IWM, and then a further staff exchange between the education team at the IWM and their counterparts at the History Museum. Other connections have been established between academics and artists from the former Yugoslavia and Lebanon, and with the Central arts organisation in Birmingham. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2023 |
| Sector | Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
| Impact Types | Cultural |
| Description | An image of Ratko Mladic - Hauntings of the Panopticon: Workshop with Youth initiative for Human Rights, Belgrade |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Third sector organisations |
| Results and Impact | The day long workshop with the NGO Hub - a space by Youth Initiative for Human Rights (YIHR) was held in December 2022 under the title: An image of Ratko Mladic - Hauntings of the Panopticon. It invited 50 young people from Serbia, Bosnia Herzegovinia and Kosovo to work with the contentious images in public spaces in the Balkans. We asked how can we intervene in directed representations behind graffiti, portraits and adverts of political nature? What are these pictures creating beyond their instructive messages? What aesthetics can we offer to challenge such visual stories? The young people joined us to explore the possibilities of changing our urban environments and encouraging citizens to see the layers of meaning at work in creation of images of our surrounding. Youth Initiative for Human Rights (YIHR) is a regional network of non-governmental organisations with programmes in Serbia, Croatia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo. The basic values of the Initiative are truth, justice, accountability, equality, freedom, democracy and peace. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Centrala networking event for artists from Central and Eastern Europe |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | In collaboration with Centrala Space we held a networking event for the Central and Eastern European (CEE) Creatives in London. The CEE Creatives Network exists to support the Central and Eastern European migrant creatives currently working in the UK arts and culture sector. Through the structure of a centralised database, this network brings together creative peers to self-promote, collaborate, build solidarity and share opportunities - whether working in art, music, production, or any range of disciplines. This event is a part of the development of the national CEE Creatives Network, led by Centrala Space. As a part of the networking event three CEE creatives presented their projects, practice and research. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Contested (in)visibilities and memorial cultures: towards a critical reading of cultural heritage and conflict, Orient-Institut Beirut |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | In the workshop "Contested (in)visibilities and memorial cultures" at the Orient-Institut Beirut, on March 15, 2023, we explored memorial cultures and considered critical readings of heritage and the impact of conflict on arts and cultural production. We conducted an interdisciplinary exchange with local scholars and artists about landscape, architecture and industrial ruins in order to understand sites of tangible and intangible heritage and engage with visual arts and design practice. We explored unpacking in/visibility, un/official narratives, in/formal memorial practices as reference points for conflict captured in Lebanon, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Colombia. Demarcated by its diversity and complexity, contested heritage is a global issue for tourism, politics, urbanization and education and we approached it from the lens of philosophy, cultural history, archaeology, museology, design and the arts. It was supported and organized by the Peace and Conflict Culture Network, Orient-Institut Beirut and the documenta Institut Kassel. The workshop was attended by 15 participants from Lebanon and beyond. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | Ethics of display: Online symposium |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Ethics of display The material past lives, as do the testimonies of victims of genocide and human rights abuses. These frequently form a central part of the narratives of violence in Holocaust and genocide museums and other sites of memory. However, the use of victims' testimonies, personal artefacts, photographs and even in some cases physical remains poses questions about the ethics of display. Firstly, to what extent might this process risk re-victimising? Secondly, do museums have a moral duty towards the dead they display or their belongings that they exhibit? Thirdly, how should museums store, handle and display both human remains and personal artefacts? These are merely a few of the myriad moral questions that researchers and museum staff must deal with in their everyday encounters with remains. This online symposium explored this contested space, with contributions from Tali Nates, director of the Johannesburg Genocide Centre, Dr. Zuzanna Dziuban of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Hasan Hasanovic of the Srebrenica Memorial Centre, and James Bulgin, Director of Public History at the Imperial War Museum. In addition, it explored possible themes and ideas for the 'Why Remember?' international conference as part of the symposium and invited both past participants and those wishing to attend in 2023 to engage with the Steering Committee of the Peace and Conflict Culture Network to assist in shaping the call for papers for the 2023 conference. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Staff exchange with Imperial War Museum and History Museum of Bosnia Herzegovinia |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | James Bulgin, head of Public History at the Imperial War Museum, visited Sarajevo as part of a staff exchange program between the IWM and the History Museum of Bosnia Herzegovinia. Over 3 days, he shared his expertise and experiences from curating the new Holocaust gallery at the IWM, and advised the History Museum team on their plans for the redesign of their Besieged Sarajevo exhibition. He also made a site visit to the new Reporter's House museum in Sarajevo, established by the Balkan Investigative Reporter's Network, and again advised them on their plans for the interactive displays and content. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Why Remember Conference |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The 'Why Remember?' conference 2022 addressed the complex and contested questions that face post-conflict societies. What should we remember, what should we forget, and, ultimately, why? It will explore the role of publicly visible memory and its potential impact on issues such as reconciliation and healing in the wake of conflict, and how, either consciously or unconsciously, memory processes shape the present and the future. These questions of memory (and forgetting) are intensely political and have far-reaching consequences, and thus these debates are vital to institutions of cultural memory that engage with the past in order to make sense of the present and build a more peaceful future. The conference explored how museums and other cultural institutions deal with traces of the past. What is the role, if any, of such institutions in supporting counter-narratives and making sense of contested pasts as a part of peacebuilding and conflict prevention? The conference facilitated connections with academics, pedagogues and other relevant stakeholders engaged in mobilising arts, heritage and social institutions in the field of peacebuilding, conflict and cultural discourse, bringing together academics and practitioners who work on post-conflict societies, as well as organisations and practitioners in countries that have recently experienced armed conflict or genocide. Delivered in a fully hybrid format over 3 days to allow for wider and more equitable participation, the conference was attended by over 50 delegates from all over the world. The keynote speaker was Tali Nates, director of the Johannesburg Holocaust and Genocide Centre. The conference included a visit to the Srebrenica Memorial Centre and a keynote by it's director, Emir Suljagic. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | YIHR/BOLD/USAID/VIIAcademy Youth workshop on Civic Discourse |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Third sector organisations |
| Results and Impact | This workshop was organised by the VII Academy, Youth Initiative for Human Rights and USAID as part of the BOLD Youth engagement program. it involved 50 participants from Serbia, Bosnia Herzegovinia and Montenegro in a one week training workshop focusing on strategies to create innovative and original interventions in civic discourse that can empower participants to become leaders in their local communities and develop effective strategies to address the vital issues they are faced with. As part of the workshop, Dr Lowe led one of the days exploring the issues of contested memory and history, and the role of museums and other similar sites of memory in reconciliation. The group were very engaged and the debates around collective memory and guilt were profound and powerful. Feedback from the participants was very positive. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |