The Rwandan genocide took place against a backdrop of widespread indifference. Between April and June 1994, soldiers and militiamen, aided by a section of the civilian population, killed between 800,000 and 1,000,000 people who opposed the regime and were members of the Tutsi minority.
“Ten years after the genocide, in the western part of the country, I interviewed and photographed Rwandans, both male and female, who had confessed to their participation in the massacres,” says photographer Alexis Cordesse.
Since 1996, Cordesse has produced several works on what happened in Rwanda. To mark the 20th anniversary of the genocide, ikono! in Belgium is exhibiting two of his main works: L’Aveu (2004) and Absences (2013).
The work of Alexis Cordesse is the result of a long series of investigations and interviews with the survivors and perpetrators. By bringing out the uniqueness of this event and its traumatic impact on the Rwandan population, his photographs resist facile moralizing on mass slaughter, the suffering of its victims and the inhumanity of its perpetrators.
Read the full article on the French version of L’Oeil.
EXPOSITION
Rwanda, l’aveu / absences
March 14 – April 19, 2014
Ikono – Caravan’Serail
47 rue Lesbroussart
1050 Bruxelles
Rwanda, wounded vision
April 5 – September 14, 2014
Musée Kazern Dossin
Goswin de Stassartstraat 153
2800 Mechelen
Belgium
www.alexiscordesse.com
http://www.ikono.be
https://www.kazernedossin.eu
