Aftermath: The Fallout of War—America and the Middle East, organized by the Harn Museum of Art, brings together the work of twelve international photographers and artists offering a closer look at armed conflict through images of refugees, loss, history, environmental dangers, and veterans from the U.S. and Middle East. Artists in the exhibition are Lynsey Addario, Jananne Al-Ani, Jennifer Karady, Gloriann Liu, Rania Matar, Eman Mohammed, Farah Nosh, Suzanne Opton, Michal Rovner, Stephen Dupont, Ben Lowy, and Simon Norfolk.
The exhibition includes ninety photographs, two videos and an educational touch table, each depicting the conditions, and voices, of people and environments caught in war’s wake, from Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Lebanon, Libya, Palestine, Israel and America. Together the images in Aftermath urge a reflection on loss, offer a comparison of the past in relation to the present, and encourage visitors to ask what the future may hold.
Aftermath expands new territories largely unexamined in traditional war coverage by twelve artists that combine rigorous journalism with fine art sensibilities. Each photographer also claims an oblique, moral imperative that cautions viewers against binary thinking (us/them; good/bad), urging instead a wider consciousness and compassion toward the repercussions of war for all involved.
The exhibition is made possible by the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Harn 25th Anniversary Fund, the Florida Division of Cultural Affairs, the University of Florida Office of Research, the John Early Publication Endowment, and the Joanne L. and Edward R. Block Charitable Trust, with additional support from the Harn Curator of Photography Endowment.
Aftermath: The Fallout of War—America and the Middle East will travel to the Gund Gallery at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio from January to April 2017; and The John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art in Sarasota, affiliated with Florida State University, from September 2017 to January 2018.
