In 1993, Americans Chris Riley and Douglas Niven came across 6000 photographic negatives hidden inside S-21, the former high school, converted into a secret prison by the Khmer Rouge in 1975. These negatives documented 6000 of the 14200 Cambodians who were imprisoned, tortured and executed within or nearby S-21. Nhem Ein, who would become the official photographer of the Khmer Rouge, took these photographs. In 1997 one hundred of these photographs were exhibited in a show entitled S-21 during a photography festival Les Rencontres photographiques d'Arles in Arles, Southern France. Later that year at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, 22 photographs were exhibited in a show entitled Photographs from S-21: 1975-1979. Both and more infamously the later sparked controversy over whether the placing of these images in these settings was in turn claiming them to be art. In Thierry de Duve's essay Art in the Face of Radical Evil the idea of appropriateness and responsibility in this decision is examined.
After visiting the S-21 photographs exhibited at the Arles de Duve was compelled to examine his experience and come to terms with how he could absorb the information being displayed to him within this setting. He questioned these images placed within a city celebrating photography and goes on to question them placed within MoMA. To do so de Duve argues that it must be made clear the purpose of MoMA as opposed to another site where such photographs may be more acceptable to exhibit. This lies in what MoMA is and what it stands to represent. As an art institution, it is a place in which "some human artifacts are being collected and preserved under the name of art and shown in the name of art" (de Duve 2008). Such an artifact's basis for inclusion hinges on both its aesthetic judgment and its comparability with the surrounding objects artistic merit for public exhibition. Therefore the inclusion of the S-21 photographs collects and preserves them as art and displays them as art.
Despite this general assumption made from the foundation of what MoMA is as an art institution, both the Adrienne Williams, the curatorial assistant who organised the MoMA show, and Christian Caujolle, the art director of the Arles show, avoid labeling these images as art. The wall text for Photographs from S-21 quoted Riley and Niven referring to the power of the images and fact that they warranted viewing by a larger audience. De Duve also examines MoMA's chief curator of photography, Peter Galassi's, statement regarding the fact that all photography is relevant to the study of photography. This statement in itself is accurate to photography as a medium however when one places a photograph within an art institution it becomes examined as comparable to the art around it and therefore as art itself.
To strengthen his point de Duve examines the way Caujolle placed the images under the rubric The Duty of Memory in Arles and inextricably stated that his reasons for their inclusion were in no way aesthetic, but instead political. To further this demonstration Caujolle artistically designed their installation to deny any aesthetic value they may have had by placing them in poor lighting accompanied with hard to access text and arranged in a grid to represent the way in which they were found as opposed to a traditional gallery layout.
Despite objections to the photographs being placed in these exhibitions under an assumption of art they are still viewed within the frame of the art institution. As de Duve points out in Arles, the festival's reason for existence was ambiguous enough to accept such an inclusion however "the reason for MoMA to exist is not ambiguous at all. It is to collect and exhibit art, not to foster the duty of memory or to testify to the monstrosities engendered by political madness".
"How could these pictures...be viewed critically by anyone, whether editor, curator, or viewer? How could someone looks at 6,000 of these images and make decisions about which 100 to print? ...Whose portrait was good enough to make the cut? By what measure?" (Roma 1997)
De Duve poses the same question as Roma and examines the responsibility of all parties involved. Commencing at the curatorship of Niven and Riley who saw "the possibility of making beautiful photographs" from the negatives they helped restore (Simon 2011). From their original selection came the photos shown around the world and they themselves own copyright over them. They were the first curators of the images, selecting 100 from 6000, deciding on photographic quality, historical value and a cross-section of Tuol Sleng's victims.
"If Niven and Riley are held responsible for altering the nature of remembrance of the Cambodian genocide in North America through their selection of the S-21 photographs, then a critical examination needs to be equally applied to the institutions, such as the Museum of Modern Art, that helped facilitate the exposure of prints" (Sischy 2009) The space in which the images were exhibited in MoMA was designated as "a place where visitors may pause to sit and reflect, and where museum curators may share their enthusiasms for particular photographs" and as previously mentioned the art institution itself comes with a particular predisposed mode of viewing the artifacts within it. The setting alters the nature of remembrance attempting to transform it into a purely aesthetic image, accompanied with noncommittal wall text.
Despite the seeming denial of responsibility from the curators and museum Nhem Ein is unashamed in claiming that he is the artist. "He hoped that people would admire the photographer's skill because they were nice and clear and without technical error. And secondly he hoped they would feel pity and compassion for the prisoners" (Dunlop 2006). This however goes against de Duve's understanding of what an artist is, a legitimate representative of humanity within an aesthetic domain, de-legitimising humanism, the idea that humanity includes the tasteless and uncultivated. Not only does de Duve reject Nhem Ein's claim to be the artist but also do the curators and the museum in their avoidance of referring to the photographs as art, despite placing them within the art institution. There is no honor in claiming the title of artist in this situation.
In conclusion to his argument de Duve resolves that the responsibility lies with the viewer alone. He determines the silence of the curator and museum to be embarrassment and reluctance to take responsibility. Like himself, the viewer has been given no choice, information or guidance and therefore must examine why the photographs exist in the art environment, critiquing the curators, museum and photographer, and absorbing the information presented to them within the exhibition.
"...the responsibility of addressing them is imperatively transferred to the viewer of the photos, whether...you or me. Calling the photos by the name of art, baptizing them, in the second person - "You are art" - is just one way, the clumsiest, certainly, of making sure that the people in the photos are restored to their humanity; and this, not their so-called art status, is of course what matters' (de Duve 2008)
This responsibility of interrogation has sparked many printed reviews and personal comments in the museums visitor book. As de Duve believes the viewer is responsible for examination, with so many viewers the conclusion as to whether these photographs belong as art is mixed, from numerous visitors happily accepting the photographs as art to the disgust of just as many claiming the exhibition to be 'mute', 'neutral' and carried out in the 'coldest possible way' (Hughes 2003).
Amongst the blame, denial and embarrassment of responsibility and ownership that this test case uncovers, there remains the question of 'if not art then what and how can the viewer access these images?' This is the undertone of De Duve's discussion all along. In his conclusion he briefly mentions the humanity of the images, the humanity that first caused him to examine the reason behind the exhibition. The images represent the people in the photographs on display, and also the other 14100 people that walked through the same doors (Roma 1997) of that old high school. "The school has now become the Tuol Sleng Museum of Genocide. The photos are permanently on view, most of them in small format, and frequently receive visits from the victims families, who come to mourn their loved ones' (de Duve 2008) Perhaps this is the sole place where the photographs belong.
References
de Duve, T, 2008. Art in the Face of Radical Evil. October, 125, 3-23
Dunlop, N, 2006. The Lost Executioner: A Story of the Khmer Rouge. 1st ed. Walker & Company
Glessing, J. 2012. Cambodian Genocide Photos at ROM raise Art vs. Documentary Difficulties. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.canadianart.ca [Accessed 16 May 13]
Hughes, R, 2003. The abject artefacts of memory: photographs from Cambodia's genocide. Media, Culture & Society, 25/23, 23-44
Manning, P, 2011. Governing Memory: justice, reconciliation and outreach at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. Memory Studies, 5:2, 165- 181
MoMA, 1997. An Exhibition of Photographs of Khmer Rouge Prisoners opens this month at the Museum of Modern Art. Press Release, May
Reyes, R. 2012. Sudden Vicinity of Things. [ONLINE] Available at: http://curating-lab.blogspot.com.au. [Accessed 17 May 13]
Roma, T, 1997. Facing Death. The Chronicle of Higher Education, The Arts, B10 Simon, R. I., 2011. A shock to thought: Curatorial judgement and the public
exhibition of 'difficult knowledge'. Memory Studies, 4:4, 432-449
Sischy, J, 2009. The Ethics of Rememberance: The S-21 Photographs. Masters of Fine Arts. Montreal, Quebec, Canada: Concordia University.