Museum of Communication in Bern
In Bern, at the Museum of Communication a new exhibit — “Images Mensongeres” shows different examples of manipulations and propaganda. The Museum new exhibit has assembled and organized a collection of documents to show how information can be distorted or falsified through its presentation.
The exhibition plunges in the universe of medias, politics, sports, and war, and even touches on the world of the comic strip.
“Images are an integral part of our daily life”, says Jacob Messerli, the Museum’s director. “We assume they reflect reality. We don’t doubt their objectivity, we believe in their authenticity. But all images don’t show all the truth. As with the written word, the photograph can lie. That is the subject of our exhibition.”
The exhibits 300 pieces take the spectator into the world of doubt. Images deceive, figures introduce themselves into scenes or disappear from them, legendary photographs are used to support various political arguments…. In January 2006 a man with his arms wide in welcome is photographed with, in the background, a cloud of smoke. AFP’s subtitled text reads, “a religious muslim tries to calm the crowd.” The magazine Stern takes the liberty of titling the image, “a religious muslim inflames a crowd of believers in the lebanese capital.”
In wartime, images are often used toward propagandistic ends, decontextualized or even falsified. As Rudyard Kipling said, ‘Truth is the first victim of war.’
The exhibit in Bern invites us also to discover this manipulation everywhere: in the celebrity press, on music album covers, and even in comic books. In the 1950’s, the nephews of Donald, Riri, Fifi and Loulou find a copy of ‘Mein Kampf’ ina garbage dump.
Around 1970, the two women of Roxy Music scantily dressed in bikinis disappeared from the original jacket cover. Times change, fashions go out, and mentalities change. But where and how do we find the heritage of the past? Do we re-invent history? The exhibit tries to pose these provocative questions.
Among the interesting pieces: different versions of the same postcard of Lenin on the Sverdlov square (in the second version, a few years after the first when Trotski was out of favor, Trotski has disappeared from the postcard, airbrushed out of history); a photograph from Blick from 1997 from an article on the 58 people (36 Swiss) massacred in Luxor in which the magazine altered the photograph to make the river look bloodied; and photos from the recent war in Iraq.
‘Lying Pictures’ at the Museum of Communication, Helvetiastraasse 16, Berne. Through 6 July 2008. Tuesday - Sunday 10h - 17h, Tel: +41 31 357 5555, www.mfk.ch.
