Still Searching…

The conditions governing the digital world have led to a radical diversification not only in photography but also in the theory that underpins it and the history that is written about it. Photographic media and forms are incorporated into complex tech technological, capitalist and ideological networks; the experts who are conducting scholarly research into the role of photographic images thus come from very different disciplines. The expansion of the discourse surrounding these images is also reflected in Still Searching…, the blog on photographic theory that was initiated by Fotomuseum Winterthur in 2012 and which subjects all aspects of photography and its role in visual culture to interdisciplinary scrutiny. The bloggers invited to the online format operate at the forefront of research and enhance our awareness of current issues that are relevant to photography.

Blog series: Now Return My Story, and Wipe My Mouth with Bread

Renée Akitelek Mboya | 25.04. – 30.09.2023
Now Return My Story, and Wipe My Mouth with Bread

This series – titled Now Return My Story, and Wipe My Mouth with Bread – will reflect on the images produced and circulated to commemorate the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. This year marks the 29th year since the beginning of the killings, which took place over a period of 100 days between the 6th of April and the 16th of July 1994, where an estimated 800,000 to 1,000,000 Tutsi and a number of moderate Hutu were slaughtered. Although the exact figure is unknown, official Rwandan government documents estimate that the number of people killed in the genocide is 1,074,017, of whom 93.7 percent were Tutsi. Kwibuka starts on the 7th of April every year.

i. Kwibuka, the 'Remembering'

Tuesday, 25.04.2023

<div>Early in the day on the 7th of April, as we in Rwanda wake into the paroxysm of collective mourning, an editorial exercise begins to take place online. The mood is measured, careful. No pretty girls dancing on TikTok, no rappers spitting lines, no comedians – no music, no laughter. </div>

ii. Babonana, We See Each Other

Friday, 05.05.2023

<div>We continue with the theme of a counter-archive. What does it mean, and in what ways is it empowering, to witness the construction of a counter-archive, alongside public performances of grief and articulations of loss? By counter-archives we mean alternative sources, and resources, which allow the expression of a counter-narrative that conventional archives cannot, in many respects, accommodate. </div>

iii. Drunken Mobs, Pile of Dead

Tuesday, 05.09.2023

<div>The stories we hear of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi often leave the impression of crazed masses – killers – descending from the hills, clubs and machetes in hand: a surge, a roar. I live on the bottom of one of these hills, next to quiet marshland filled with reeds and alive with toads in the rainy season. Often I imagine a stray cat might drop a lost tooth on my doorstep. </div>

iv. By Falling from a Tree or Hung Like a Dog

Thursday, 14.09.2023

<div>A throwback perhaps, from a circular published on 6 April 1994, in the hours before the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi began: ‘Rwanda (Bizimana) confirmed that President Habyarimana had been assassinated and that at present the recovery of the burned bodies is being undertaken. He noted that the President was accompanied by close advisers also. </div>

v. Sweet Like Honey

Friday, 29.09.2023

<div>In May 2022 we assembled a collective of amateur photographers from the community of Nyabageni in the mountainous Northern Province village of Kingi, in Musanze District. These photographers, from a community of internally displaced people in the foothills of the Virunga Mountains, were challenged to each produce a series of photographs that would tell us their perspective on the story of their community.</div>