 Welcome everyone to this online symposium on art and humanity. What is possible? My name is Philippe Stoll. I am the Senior Communication Advisor for the International Committee of the Red Cross. Today is the fourth and last session of a symposium which has seen a number of leading experts discussing and debating on this fascinating topic. This time we will have four pre-recorded sessions and of course a very lively Q&A session at the end. So please keep your question or post your question on the chat box. I can guarantee that it is going to be a very interesting and exciting session as we are going to explore the question of impacting. First we'll be joined by Ashton Hoyer who is the museum liaison and evaluation expert at the EPFL in Lausanne. In her paper she questions how art can be a vector for change. We will then listen to Paula Forgione who is a health care in danger delegate at the International Committee of the Red Cross. In her paper she will present the Humite and Workers perspective on how she collaborates with artists. After that Luis Carlos Tovar will share with us his creative process to address Humite and situation. He is a visual artist based in France and Colombia. And finally the closing remarks will be done by Katarzyna Gradska. She is a visiting professor at the University of Neuchâtel and senior researcher, Peace Research Institute in Oslo. And don't forget that today this is your last chance to participate to a core creation of an artwork with Swiss based artist Gilles Fourfangler. He will join us for a 10-minute session. The artwork will consist of a co-authored text which will be published later this year in the symposium's paper. Gilles Fourfangler's work focuses on reading, writing, performances, as well as painting and graphic arts. He has had numerous exhibitions in Switzerland and around the world. He works with Skopja Gallery in Geneva. Before we get started I would like to sincerely thank all my partners in crime. Julie Enkel-Julien, the head of cultural development of the Acherade in Geneva and Pascal Urschmit, the director of the International Red Cross Red Cross Museum. I'd like also to thank Pierre-Antoine Possa from the Museum who help us for the coordination and the production of the symposium. The symposium is the result of a collaboration between the International Red Cross Red Crescent Museum, the Acherade in Geneva, the Red Cross of Geneva and the International Committee of the Red Cross. We would like to sincerely thank all the partners for their enthusiastic support. It is time now to begin. Please use the chat box for your question. Participate in Gilles Fourvangler's artwork and enjoy the symposium. I'm Dr. Afshan Hoyou. I'm a museologist and education expert. Today I want to talk to you about the art of transformation. My talk will focus on the core of the experience of looking at art, what shapes the perceptions, interpretations and meaning-making processes of the viewer and how this can be turned into both an active and transformative learning experience. I will include examples from my research and practice working directly with museum goers as participants. Can art be a vector for change? What if people's connections with art could encourage positive change in perceptions, beliefs and even society? Through engagement, critical reflection, dialogue and transformative learning it is possible. I begin with two basic questions. Can art trigger a transformative learning process and do transformative learning experiences happen in the museum? My research and practice in various museums and in different cultural projects has shown that the answer is yes. Now let's address the nature of museum objects and meaning-making. Objects are polysemic. Museums present objects, artifacts and works of art for the public who in turn observe them, reflect and make meaning. Museums will often focus on presenting the significance of the object, its context, history and meaning. The polysemic nature of objects is important. Is this allows the viewer to see and feel different things while viewing the same object as well as to construct multiple meanings? Here's an example from the Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum collections. We have a cup. We see a utilitarian object, a mass produced aluminum cup used to drink from. However, let us not forget this is a museum object and it is part of the international Red Cross and Red Crescent Museum collections. Why? This cup tells a story. The cup is from Iraq. Dating from the period 1985 to 1990, the historical context of the cup and its intended use evokes war, notably the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s. As Paul Bouvier states in his article, Prisoner's Objects, Art, Communication and Humanity, in extremely harsh detention conditions, where prisoners suffer from abandonment, isolation, deprivation, violence and degrading treatment. An object or an artistic or intellectual activity can restore their dignity and assure their survival as human beings. This particular cup also has a personal story. This Iraqi Army cup was engraved by an Iranian prisoner of war and given to the delegate, helping him to return to his home country. Suddenly, this object can be seen to represent human suffering as well as a release from suffering, becoming a symbol of survival and human dignity, as well as a gesture of gratitude. I'm showing you this cup today to display how intention and or intended use is different from associated stories or meanings. Elaine Hoyman-Gurion explains that the meaning of an object in an exhibition can sometimes come from the associated story or associated history. She uses the example of a bowl, an object manufactured in huge quantities. A bowl that can be bought in any shop may not seem to be very significant, but it's a label informs the museum visitor that this bowl comes from Auschwitz. The visitor automatically transfers their knowledge of the Holocaust to the object. Thus, the story of an object may be of fundamental importance in the object's meaning. Now moving forward, let's keep in mind that we are talking about objects or artworks that are displayed in a certain context. The museum, within which individuals search for meaning when they are viewing them and the vital importance of stories or associated meanings. Now to focus on the art of transformation, I will attempt to answer three further questions by delving into research as well as methodology that I have used within specific cultural projects working directly with museum goers, or as I prefer to say, with participants as individual actors within meaning-making processes. So first, what is transformative learning? Next, how does transformative learning occur? And how do we foster these experiences? So what is transformative learning? Studying the reactions of women re-entering community college programs in the 1970s, Jack Mesero outlined transformational learning. Transformative learning is a theory of adult learning that utilizes disorienting dilemmas to challenge participants thinking. Individuals are then encouraged to use critical thinking and questioning to consider if they're underlying assumptions and beliefs about the world are accurate. Transformative learning theory considered a subset of constructivism serves to explain the learning process of constructing and appropriating new and revised interpretations of the meaning of an experience in the world. In transformative dimensions of adult learning, Dr. Jack Mesero, the founding father of the theory of transformative learning, attempts to redress the apparent oversight in adult learning theory that has resulted from a failure to recognize the central roles played by an individual's acquired frame of reference, through which meaning is construed and all learning takes place. And by the transformation of these habits of expectation during the learning process, from a transformative perspective and in alignment with the constructivist paradigm, meaning is considered to exist within each individual and is generated through the interpretation of experiences based on past experience with objects and people in the external world. Mesero maintains that meaning making is central to learning and defines the meaning making process as such. As there are no fixed truths or totally definitive knowledge, and because circumstances change, the human condition must be best be understood as a continuous effort to negotiate contested meanings. That is why it is so important that adult learning emphasize contextual understanding, critical reflection on assumptions and validating meaning by assessing reasons. The justification for much of what we know and believe, our values and our feelings depend on the context, biological, biographical, historical, cultural, in which they are embedded. We make meaning with different dimensions of awareness and understanding. Mesero defined the transformative learning processes having 10 steps or stages, beginning with a disorienting dilemma, then self examination, then a critical assessment of assumptions, followed by recognition of a connection between one's discontent and the process of transformation, then an exploration of options for new roles, relationships and action, planning a course of action, then acquiring knowledge and skills for implementing one's plans, a provisional trying of new roles, then building competence and self confidence in new roles and relationships. And finally, a reintegration into one's life of the basis of conditions dictated by one's new perspective. How does transformational learning occur? What must happen for a person to change their view of the world? Mesero believed that this occurs when people face a disorienting dilemma. Disorienting dilemmas are experiences that don't fit into a person's current beliefs about the world. When faced with a disorienting dilemma, people are forced to reconsider their beliefs in a way that will fit this new experience into the rest of their world view. This often happens through critical reflection in the context of dialogue with other people. Here we must note the link that exists between transformative learning theory and humanitarian action. Both begin with a dilemma. That's the trigger for transformative learning is an acute internal and personal crisis, or disorienting dilemma. Disorientation occurs when we encounter an experience that does not match our expectations or meaning structures, such as a profound and sudden life experience. However, research has also shown that triggering events can be both internal and external and may actually be part of a long cumulative process. According to Edward Taylor, transformation may also be triggered by integrating circumstances such as the search for something that is lacking in an individual's current life, not necessarily always a life threatening event. In order to delve into practice, I will use the work I did curating the section Dialogues on Humanity, designing the educational methodology and working directed with publics of all ages as part of the project, Humanitarian Principles Here and Now. Humanitarian Principles Here and Now is a contemporary art installation produced by the Musee de Lise and the Swiss Ministry of Foreign Affairs in conversation with the International Committee of the Red Cross. The installation is currently travelling around the world. Through art, the project aims to allow people to take time to think, to feel and to reflect on the humanitarian sphere. For the first section of the installation, a carte blanche was given to 10 Swiss photographers to reflect on and illustrate the humanitarian principles that are central to humanitarian action. For the second section, Dialogues on Humanity, six photographs were selected from the media, each capturing a moment in time with a specific context and story. The aim of this section is to invite visitors to explore their reactions, thoughts and feelings, as well as points of view and personal experiences they're raised on. The overall objective of Dialogues on Humanity is to use six carefully selected media photographs as a tool to encourage audiences to slow down the process of reading images, to stimulate an inner dialogue through personal reflection, and to inspire visitor participation in discussion, dialogue and exchange about humanity. The presentation method of the photographs works hand in hand with the educational methodology used to foster transformative learning experiences. To summarize, these are the steps of my methodology for Dialogues on Humanity. Observation. First visitors are free to explore the works on display, both looking at the details of the photographs as well as concentrating on their feelings and personal reactions. The images are purposefully displayed without the captions directly next to them in order to encourage critical reflection. The stories behind the images are purposefully displayed in such a way that visitors will consciously look for them after having viewed the installation content, perhaps inspired by curiosity and questions they may have. Not immediately providing the stories is there for fundamental to the process. During the observation of the images, the individual is often drawn to a photograph, perhaps by a certain element, detail, emotional reaction to the image or a question they may have about it. They connect with it. The observer then begins to think critically asking questions such as, what am I looking at? And what does this image mean to me? And this can act like a mirror. Awakening stories and experiences inside the individual. The transformative learner will then devise the story behind the image according to who they are and what knowledge and experiences they have and thus construct a personal interpretation. We then introduce an opportunity for Dialogue. What each individual sees and how they feel about what they see is shared, along with the underlying reasons for their interpretation, which often includes a personal story. It is important to note that when an actual educator or mediator is not present for Dialogue, this can also be an internal process for the viewer. Within the project, a digital platform is also available for sharing views and entering the conversation. Within the Dialogue, the stories behind the images are brought into the conversation. Individuals are then incited to reflect on their original interpretations as well as those of others in relation to the stories behind the images. This is not to demonstrate that their personal interpretation is false. Rather, multiple interpretations exist and are considered valid. Reframing of interpretations may occur or not, depending on individual choice. In Dialogues on Humanity, after the reframing process, we brought in the humanitarian principles into the discussion, in alignment with the objective of the project, which was to encourage reflection on humanity, impartiality, neutrality, and independence, and how they may apply to everyday life. Finally, we moved into the sharing of personal stories. Participants were asked if they would like to share a personal experience from their lives that came to mind when they looked at the image or spoke about it. These stories can also be shared via the project's digital platform. However, it's important to note that in other transformative learning experience I've devised, we moved directly from the reframing process into personal stories. The transformative learning experience proposed in this way encourages visitors to construct meaning based on their prior knowledge, understandings, and experiences. To express their interpretations, points of view and perspectives, and to reflect on the interpretations of others, then to reassess and reflect once again on their points of view and perspectives. In Transformational Learning Theory, learning occurs in one of four ways. By elaborating existing frames of reference, by learning new frames of reference, by transforming points of view or by transforming habits of the mind. According to Mesero, the Transformational Learner will examine his or her own understandings, assumptions, beliefs, and understand the implications of his or her beliefs, explore an alternative set of beliefs, meaning scheme, and critically reflect on the validity of these meaning schemes. The objective of this type of experience is to lead the learner to be more open to perspectives other than their own, becoming more accepting of alternative viewpoints. According to Edward Taylor, transformation can occur through objective reframing, which is critical reflection on the assumption of others, or subjective reframing, critical reflection, self-reflection on one's own assumptions. Therefore, critical self-reflection is essential to the process of transformative learning. To explain in simple terms, facing new information or dilemmas, the transformative learner will reassess their initial understandings and points of view through critical reflection. They may build upon their past knowledge and understandings or revise them. This process can lead to changes in their perceptions as they integrate new information and new knowledge. In my PhD research, I devised a transformative learning scale to evaluate whether visitors' prior knowledge and understandings have remained the same, been reinforced, enhanced, or changed. The aim was to identify when learning served to significantly modify understandings or shift perspectives. A major shift is seen as perspective transformation. Perspective transformation is a revision of meaning structures from experiences. Meaning structures are the concepts, beliefs, judgments, and feelings that shape an interpretation of information. According to Mesero, the transformation of meaning perspectives leads to a shift in worldview. Thus, through critical reflection on meaning perspectives, individuals can be led to adopt a more inclusive, differentiated, permeable, and integrated perspective. To summarize, Edward Taylor explains that transformative learning theory considered a subset of constructivism serves to explain the learning process of constructing and appropriating new and revised interpretations of the meaning of an experience in the world. The roots of Mesero's transformational learning theory lie in critical pedagogy and more specifically in Powell Freer's theory of conscientization, which Mesero understands as a critical consciousness leading to a more in-depth comprehension of the world. Why is this important in the humanitarian field? Encouraging visitors' engagement with art focusing on humanitarian themes can serve to alleviate the issue of different distant suffering represented in the media by directly addressing the emotional reaction of the spectator to helplessness or distress. According to Mesero, learning is defined as the process of using a prior interpretation to construe a new or revised interpretation of the meaning of one's experience as a guide to future action. Taylor explains the key to transformational learning is critical reflection on assumptions. Transformative learners can experience objective reframing, subjective reframing, as well as perspective transformation, simply defined as the revision of meaning structures from experiences. Mesero claims that fostering transformative learning experiences can lead the learner to be more open to perspectives other than their own, becoming more accepting of alternative viewpoints. Finally, as the expanded definition of transformative learning proposed by Elizabeth Casel and Dean Alice, perceives the individual as a part of a human system, transformative learning experiences can provide the possibility for an expansion of consciousness in any human system, thus the collective as well as the individual. This expanded consciousness is characterized by new frames of reference points of view or habits of the mind, as well as by a new structure for engaging the system's identity. In Casel and Alice's view, transformation occurs when individuals must modify their personal identities in relation to the identity of the group. This allows us to recognize the evolution of both individual and group identities as well as the effect learning has on group meaning perspectives and culture. Thus, the viewer's engagement in transformative experiences through art can therefore not only promote critical reflection on personal views, as well as the views of others, each individual can also be encouraged to question his or her own role in humanity and to actively engage in bringing about positive change in society as a whole. Thank you for listening. Good afternoon. I am Paula Forgione and I am a humanitarian worker at the International Committee of the Red Cross, the ICRC. I must confess to my shame that before joining the ICRC I considered art as some kind of luxurious hobby. Something a little bit snob that was maybe for the elite but that was definitely very far from the job I had chosen a job in close contact with the people affected by war and violence and with their very concrete needs. Well, I quickly realized that I could not have been more wrong and art erupted very rapidly in my life as a humanitarian worker. I still remember my first encounter with artistic expression while I was on mission with the ICRC. I was visiting a prison that had an outstanding record of malnutrition, overcrowding, torture and I noticed a group of inmates who were very engaged in producing, in making some objects. So I got closer to them and I noticed they were transforming some plastic bags that was pretty much the only item available to them into little objects for everyday life like pen cases or little pouches. I can show you a photo that I have taken myself of those objects. So I started talking to the inmates and they involved me in their dilemmas about the choice of colors, about the design of the objects. In the beginning I was a little bit surprised that people with so many other problems had found the energy and the interest of making these objects. That weren't for selling objects, were not for paying any services it was not an initiative from the prison. It was really a spontaneous initiative of this group of inmates and the objects they were making were just for themselves. But I realized that creating and designing these objects was a copy mechanism for these inmates. In fact it was essential to their survival in this dehumanizing prison because by creating something new and something beautiful the inmates wanted to remind everybody but themselves first that in spite of starvation, in spite of torture, in spite of everything they were going through their inner human being had not been destroyed. They were after all much more than a bunch of dehabilitated bodies in search for in need of food and medicines. That moment for me was like an epiphany and I felt like I witnessed, I was witnessing the power of artistic creation and from that moment on art has always been an essential part of my work and my life as a humanitarian in countries affected by war and violence. In all countries where the ICRC had sent me on a mission, I was trying to meet the local artists I was trying to see their work to talk to them, to engage with the local art scene and this was extremely important to me. My days as a humanitarian worker were spent mainly listening to people who had been affected by war, by violence people who had been displaced who were injured, who had missed loved ones. My job was to protect their lives and dignity to prevent and to alleviate their suffering. But this suffering for me was extremely unspeakable immeasurable and very difficult to comprehend and even more difficult to alleviate. Thankfully in this journey I was not alone and art has always been by my side. With their creativity their irony their unique perspective on mankind the local artist I met during my missions opened me the doors to their most intimate feelings, their most intimate emotions their fears and their pain but also their hopes and their dreams not only as individuals but also as members of the very community that as a humanitarian worker I was trying to support. The forms of art that I encountered during my missions are extremely diverse and range from photography to performance from sculpture to painting I would like to share with you two of them that have particularly marked my experience as a humanitarian worker but there would be so many more that I would like to share with you. The first one is an experience I had with a collective of photographers which I joined when I was a mission in Central America. These local photographers were meeting every week to do photo walks and take photos in the streets of the city centre including in the areas of the city centre that were known for being very dangerous because of criminality because of gangs but this collective of photographers which is called El Centro as a clique was not focusing on images on capturing images of misery of poverty on capturing images of violence they were focusing in capturing the daily life of the many people who in spite of violence and criminality go every day in those streets to live and to work and they do it with a lot of simplicity a lot of humbleness a lot of dignity and also a lot of resilience To me the images they were capturing looked extremely powerful but even more powerful was the very action of these photographers of walking in the streets as you can see in the photo the huge line is the line of street photographers from the collective and maybe walking in the streets can look for something for some of us at least something very normal but in that context walking on those streets was like a little revolution was like a statement that in spite of violence this street the public space belongs to everybody and so these people by walking in the streets were doing in my perspective almost a performance to claim back their public space in a very discrete but also a powerful way another example of art I encountered in the field that I would like to share with you is from Gaza from the Gaza Strip where this artist Abusal designed a metro line now I don't know if you have ever been to Gaza but the infrastructures are actually quite poor many people commute by donkey so definitely a metro line is not a plan that will be realised in the immediate future but this artist who is from Gaza has travelled to other cities and have seen that so many cities have metro lines but why can't we think the same for Gaza why Gaza can be a place a global place a dynamic, a vibrant place like Paris, like London so he designed this metro line and also he walked around the Strip to put these signs of them corresponding to the stops that he imagined for this metro line so this project made me think on the one hand of how Gaza could be and on the other on how Gaza unfortunately is it's really very striking in making us see this contrast between what this place actually is and what it could be it allows us to dream with him I reflected on the connections between art and humanitarian work beside my own personal experience or driving from my own personal experience and I think there are two important elements there are two ways how humanitarian workers can benefit from the artist first of all we are now experiencing a moment where humanitarian organizations are more and more committed in listening to the needs of the communities that they want to help without assuming what these needs are the humanitarian organizations are more and more committed in understanding the resilient mechanism already existing within the communities rather than proposing creating inventing new resilient mechanism so in this process of being as close as possible to the communities and its needs and its resilient mechanism I think that the input as a humanitarian we can have from the local artist is extremely important often in their works in the works of the artist there is everything we need they talk about their pain they talk about their hopes their dreams often their works crystallize not only their hopes their dreams, their frustration but the frustration, the hopes and the dreams of thousands and thousands of people who have endured violence sometimes for years and years and sometimes from generation after generation all this pain, all these dreams and all these hopes from there are in the artist works and are talking to us to our ears and to our eyes and all we have to do as humanitarian workers is listen I think a second way how humanitarian workers can benefit from art and artist perspective has to do with our job the day to day of our job as a humanitarian we spend most of our days exchanging with two groups dealing with two groups on the one hand we talk to the people who have been affected by war and violence the people have been displaced we try to understand what they need and we try to understand what violations of humanitarian law they have suffered on the other hand we talk to the authorities we talk to the people who are responsible for the protection of the civilian population we engage with political and military leaders and sometimes these are the very people responsible for the violations the risk when you do this job every day for years and years is that you might end up perceiving the society in which you are working especially if you are a foreigner in a quite a flat and disconsolate way where people are either victims or perpetrators and there is nothing in the middle so I believe that engaging with the local artist is very important for humanitarians to avoid being trapped in this dichotonic perception of society for us to be able to see all the many shades to see all the glimpses and the corners of hope that are sometimes hidden but that are there are in those societies that where people are living in the humanizing and degrading conditions and are still trying to think about their future so I think that the artist's perception is really important for other humanitarians to be able to capture all these glimpses of hope that are existing within the society Finally I would like to conclude with a quote from a friend an artist from Gaza when I told him about this symposium I asked him what do you think is the connection between art and humanity and he replied to me with this sentence that art like fish does only live in the sea and humanity is the sea of art if we review the history of art we will find many artists who deal with humanitarian issues because they believe that life is worth making a great effort to live it with the dignity, peace and freedom I realized why my friendship with the artist was so important during all these years I spent in the field I believe that as humanitarians we also we also swim in the sea of humanity and I believe that nobody can swim alone in an ocean of sorrow so I believe that artists and humanitarians meet each other so I would like to call on you today to reflect together on how concretely we can bring art and humanitarian together. I would like the curators, the artists, the other humanitarians participating in this symposium to collectively think on how we can contribute together to a more human world thank you very much Good afternoon everybody, I hope you well My name is Gilles Fourdengler I'm a graduate and a visual artist living between Lausanne, Switzerland and Johannesburg in South Africa I'm here to invite you to participate in a collective artwork I, myself, mainly work with words text that I write but also with found text found words that I hear and read I then turn these sentences into poems to be read they are also printed on posters or tarps, painted or turned into sculptures I'm interested by writing and retelling what I hear to give it back through art pieces our everyday words and thoughts ways of speaking, of thinking of learning, of evolving For the ones who are interested to participate, I'm inviting you to share with me on a guestbook page some of your notes, comments or feedback on the topics presented today changing and to be more precise I have questions What kind of change did art bring in your life? Are there ways in which art connected your individual experience to the collective one? How? And more generally What are your thoughts following today's presentations? Thank you It's pretty simple to participate You just need to click on this link and you will be directed to a page where you will be able to post your feedback and comments My proposition is to build with your words a text around the topics of this symposium The text will be then designed and published following this symposium Every contributor will be credited or can decide to stay anonymous Feel free to give your feedback as if it was a guestbook an ID box, a common brainstorming or a complaint's office It can be keywords critical thoughts, long paragraphs short ones All is accepted There is also a video uploading option for those who prefer to talk I am really looking forward to discovering your contribution and working with them I thank you very much for your participation I'm wishing you a good afternoon Thank you The link below the video is available from now and will stay active until end of June 2021 Hi everyone, my name is Luis Carlos Tovar I am a visual artist from Bogota, Colombia currently based in Paris I am pleased to make a presentation to participate in the Colloquium Art and Humanity 2021 organized by the International Red Cross and the Red Crescent Museum In my opinion, the discussion points rising are fundamental questions in the working progress of an artist today I would like to try to address some reflections and questions that came out during the process of my recent projects I would like to start saying that art cannot be separated from the human From my point of view, the dialogue between consider art and humanity are indivisible Human activity cannot be understood without art Art participates in all life situations just as boys used to say As an artist, I am moved by a humanistic vision I make art as a gesture of resistance and non-acceptance of everyday violence I try my projects to create a different space for discussion and it is in these minimal actions that my artistic practice takes shape Brazilian artist Zildo Meireles believes that art has the ability to make microscopic but permanent changes Tania Bruguera, Cuban artist says that we must think of art as an implementation of a system and not as a production Can art be an agent of change? Art is a tool for collective construction and reflection I have been a visual artist for the last 15 years who has decentralized his practice according to the context Each project requires different sensibilities and artistic approach Can art enable art to be part of the citizens' daily life? Collective creation projects have the power to enlarge the world to question, to dialogue or discuss differences Can art enable us to perform an act of memory? I believe yes indeed Memory is a battlefield It is an unstable ground for Colombian artist Dori Salcedo during the construction of a work called Fragments a counter monument which floor is made up of the weapons delivered by the FARC after the peace treaty in Colombia some years ago Memory does not have a single author or an expiration date Art helps me to perform and question memory itself I am particularly interested in post photography and archives Through them, I can explore the process of creation of oddness and understand how personal memory shapes collective memory I would like to share with you all a short video extract based on my last photo book published in 2020 thanks to the support of Musellice and Parmigiani Fleur and co-published by R.M. The starting point of this reflection is a photograph that reveals the survival of my father during his kidnapping of the guerrilla The photograph, a polaroid hidden among the small myths of my family history is an unknown object for me On February 20, 1980 Jaime Tovar, my father was stripped of his freedom As an artist, I work with images Photographs are part of this endless ocean of images During history, photography has been used to construct truth Each memory is a construction Reality is made up of elements of fiction as well as fiction is built of elements of reality In this sense, art Photography helps me in this search for truth But we must understand that sometimes truth is not enough The role of art could also be to play with metaphors and symbols to bring a certain distance Art is a game A game to be taken very seriously, said Podoster Personally, I am interested in the metaphor as Resilience My father tells me that during the months of captivity 19 guerrillas tried to indoctrinate it through three books The Capital of Karl Marx The Diary of Che in Bolivia by Ernesto Guevara and what to do with Blade Mirleni Every day at 4 in the morning he woke up daily and millimetrical He followed a march in the humid jungle and the tropical of the Caquetá towards the next camp Only once he had the temptation to flee But for his days in April my father was already sick of a flevitis on his right leg He did not try but instead, he invented a way to remember his family He hunted butterflies and collected leaves, flowers seeds of different trees and plants that were preserved between the leaves of the revolutionary books During his kidnapping my father also traveled wild trails and witnessed unpublished landscapes in his memory The region of the Caquetá begins at the foot of the mountain and ends in the waters of Aracuara entering the Amazon jungle He missed and contemplated a blue and deep manigua He described it as a house where it never dies I don't believe art has a specific function We could even say that art is useless but it is in this uselessness or uncertainty that gives art its great potential to be a bridge for other unthinkable things Art sometimes helps me to arise problems or give visibility to complex situations but it can also be a burden I like what David Lynch said about it Art does not change anything it changes you Indeed, to edit a photographic book on personal memories forces you to edit yourself The pain of genius always comes to us in an abstract way and erase it We can intuit it in a dodgy way Imagine it, yes but never understand it in its entirety Never truly inhabit it That impossibility is symbolized here through two things that my father has shown himself so eager to conceive the proof-of-life photography and the fact that my work on it will start without ever seeing it Vulnerability is a sign of existence said Goethe There are some projects like Hadinde where the intimate becomes a political gesture Making this book to exercise on how to narrate personal memory versus collective memory My whole family has participated as other external authors like Cristina Jeras Joan Foncuberta Maria Santoyo and Lydia Doerner It has not been a book made with only two hands Each one has contributed in their own way of remembering or assuming memory the attempt to remember collectively humanize us Personal or collective memory exists but always with fictitious elements in which you relive elements of the past your experiences your culture your sensibility Memory is something alive and changing That idea has led me to other questions Is there is only personal memory Is collective memory a fantasy? Is historical critical? And collective memory ideological? Is collective memory the story that people tell about themselves? Autogiographies was born from the necessity to understand the Colombian geography at the Caribbean coast I started to revisit some of the towns and villages the utopist Eliserre Clou described in his book Voyages Sierra Mevada de Santa Marta During the journey I started to collect a color palette made by a fist of sand from each shore I visit The triptychs in this project each one correspond to a specific place The samples of the sand the femoral footprint on the back of the chair and the same chair placed on the landscape looking away from the sea or our symbols of ways in which the Caribbean coast was developed Each chair chosen and photographed belongs to an inhabitant of the sea fishermen street vendors etc Every place has its own geography and the color of the sand changes from place to place together with the people of the local customs Auto geographies records the chair's presence by making drawings and imprints on the beaches along the way The images represented walking and wandering as aesthetics acts the country as a witness and the chair as a pretext Between 2013 and 2015 I did a series called Col Portraits This in situ photo essay contained the testimonies of inhabitants in the Caribbean coast within the Colombian Magdalena region The project explores how the inhabitants of the sea have been affected by the mining conflict experienced in the area The miners' landing has not only polluted the environment but also had an impact on the vendors and the fishermen's work The violation of the rights has been overshadowed by an ecological disaster This is why these silhouettes tell us and make visible the themes and issues that are drenched with these are the portraits of four different cooperatives of artisanal fishermen affected in this region 60 testimonies that give insight on the sea changes are seen from the perception of its inhabitants The project was possible thanks to the support of the Universidad del Magdalena This site installation is called Salalespera which is located in Rome At that time there was a total denial from the Colombian government regarding the contamination of coal in this area of the Colombian Caribbean I decided to make this installation composed of five tons of coal purchased from the black market This in situ installation was exhibited at the Museo de la Universidad del Magdalena at the center of Santa Marta and was part of my first decentralized project called Autohiografias On-Doo is a visual inventory of over 50,000 photographs taken in 2015 at the Collegio General Santander in Bogota More than 300 students and teachers used a 1935 school board as a window of search in order to write and draw their memory of a school from which they were unjustly displaced in 2018 The reconstruction of their memory through the act of drawing awakens the unconscious and articulates their revaluation of their present moment When trying to remember the school they had formally inhabited a lot of the participants to a map of the current one as if they past and present had been merged In using the school board as a mental space students express and interrogate the idea that surrounds a collective form of memory This also builds into the problematic that lies in time and identity Cartographies of Scape Welcome of an artistic residency in Rome on the account of the Hila Photography Prize Established by the Italian and Latin American Institute Hila and was part of the festival Internationale di Roma My name is Jami I am from Ghana I live in Nigeria You are from Afghanistan My name is Moses My name is Mohammed Jami I am from Ghana I say to myself I have to cross and go to Italy The work intended to invoke both an individual and collective sense of memory It features refugees from the Arab shelter who recalled and narrated their journeys, crossings loses, vicissitudes and affections all of which amounted to an ephemeral and emotional record and also a form of catharsis of the participants These cartographies of Scape emerge from their space of exclusion Photographs, portraits testimonies and sound installations Thank you for taking the time to listen and thanks again to the International Red Cross for this invitation Thanks Pascal and Pierre-Antoine Hello This is Katarzyna Growska and I am happy to be here with you Thank you very much for the opportunity to share some final reflections on these very rich discussions that we've had the pleasure to listen to and take part in over the past four weeks These points of connect have offered an opportunity to encounter artists, theorists researchers and humanitarian who reflected on the connection between art and humanity and what are the possibilities So the participants were asked to respond to some of the key themes that were posted in the call for papers and some of them, the fundamental beings, can art enable us to grasp with the current humanitarian and conflict-related complexities and give them meaning Can works of art that address humanitarian issues help us achieve a more nuanced and concrete understanding of these issues How can we ensure that representations of these issues betray neither the people that are affected by them nor the situations themselves And finally what can artistic imagination do when that of a whole people is reduced to ruins? Can the artist play the role of a mediator? And I think the last presentation of Luis Carlos Tavares that we've just watched speaks directly to that issue in what way an artist offers so many possibilities of not being just an artist but going beyond that in the context of humanitarian settings. So we listened to this presentation that engaged consecutively with the following themes Learning from art, that was day one Engaging on day two Representation on day three and today we'll listen to how art is impacting So day one offered us presentations that focused on what we can learn from art itself I remember watching that day and being really impressed by what Ariana while she was discussing the exhibition Real Feelings The Artist's Visionary made us think about made us reflect on the concept of artists as radical agents in the current context of biotech surveillance Francesco Tugoni on the other hand offered a reflection on using Caravaggio's paintings for humanitarian communication as a metaphor of displacing not only art but also its use in the humanitarian visual culture and how appropriate or ethically problematic that might be and then we listened to Olivier Jo who discussed art that can represent wider issues without producing artwork about genocide and at the same time not reopening reopening the woods and producing a spectacle of suffering but looking at the work of Antonio Jazz how he deals with with the Rond and Genocide Day two produced a series of very interesting interventions that had to do with engagement and it offered reflections of engagement and how art and art-based projects in the context of humanitarian settings can play an important role in healing reconciliation, memorialization and coming to terms with conflicts and crises as Sofia Milosevic Azadek Sabut and Elodie Payar all stressed the stress importance of putting the affected individuals and their voices at the center of these art-based projects whether they are memorialization projects, reconciliation and healing practices thus providing an arena for sharing their stories and healing communities and I think the work of Luís Carlos Tovar spoke to these issues very clearly today as well this this approach might just offer a way to go beyond the individual towards the community a more collective space to memorize otherwise. On day three we looked at representation and the key issues discussed on the day were around the problems and problematics of representation as well as ethics of cultural work Dominique Lalleg Marc Herbst and Isabel de la Cour showed how complex the issues of representations are as related to art and artistic projects but at the same time what are also the pitfalls of looking at art as a neutral process practice that is de-contextualized and disconnected from time and place that it actually took place especially in the context of human suffering. So they also stressed the importance of working from local knowledges experiences beyond and against voyeuristic and worse than humanitarian gaze that has been so problematic in the humanitarian practice and in the humanitarian industry if we can say that. Towards a more constructed and community-owned approach to ethical cultural work and for example the discussion of using chair as a metaphor that embodies the absence of invisible people and at the same time the social and human connections through the act of remembering collectively was a magnificent example that artists have produced in numerous settings to reflect on issues of suffering of violence of war without bringing the particular individual and without producing a particular story. And today on day 4 we engaged with impacting and the speakers today offered some insights on first of all transformative learning how interaction with art can produce also transformative learning at the more individual level and then possibly also at communal level how that produces both a transformation and less participants in the art projects and some of it was exposed in the presentation by Luis Carlos Lovar talking about different projects of understanding conflict of coming from the individual to the collective process of coming to terms with violence conflict, war, disappearance remembering otherwise. They've also reflected and I think this is the intervention of Paola on the way art can also help humanitarians to think differently about the work that they do with their community based protection approach that has been now promoted in the humanitarian settings and working understanding the more art based community approach and therefore improving humanitarian responses. So in the next few minutes I wanted to reflect on some of the issues that were raised in these discussions as well as offer some insights based on my own work as an anthropologist and researcher and a collaborator in artistic projects. I worked a lot in conflict areas and displaced populations and also with artists who live in these situations but also with artists who work with those issues. Artists play a central role in periods of uncertainty and volatility both as commentators of events and as inspirators for change. So as Bell and Desai argued the arts are a particular potent way to activate imagination and a broader understanding of injustice, its consequences and the range of alternative possibilities. In general art plays a formative role in the constitution of social life in the ways in which people take responsibility for creating their own histories for participating in the management of their own social and political realities and that's a quote from Hubble. Here I but I also think the older artists and researchers and presenters who spoke in this symposium engage with art and see art both as political and critical. So that's the type of art that we are engaging with here in this discussion. It's not all art plays this role even though art is always political. As Mila argues art is political if it complicates not simplifies and if it extends the threat of recognition and understanding beyond what previously was seen and known. These interpretations help reveal existing power relations within society determining what previously was known and what was deemed worthy of creative exploration in the first place and identifying what previously was not seen and for not known including identification of what should be seen or known. So while artists may also attempt to contribute to political change often and work towards social change in the society they often also work towards they work in pair with the political authorities and sort of in the way of reconstituting of what it is national what it is society or what it is the kind of propaganda propaganda way of the political regimes. Therefore we have to see art as something that can work on different spectrums not only as a panacea for social justice not all art refers to the type of social justice that is being promoted also through the humanitarian work. Critical art at the same time as defined by Jacques VanSier is an art that aims to produce a new perception of the world and therefore create a commitment to its transformation and I think this is also the art that we are talking about here in this symposium. Some creative practice creates ruptures when it introduces new sensations ideas and forms of life to people's perceptions and experiences broadening the nature of societal and political discourses. For the artists and art to be engaged in transformative processes the art needs to penetrate the veneer of certainty in a dominant social order to open up a different way of seeing. And according to VanSier, this is a relational process where the artists the art and the audience work out meanings through co-creative practice. So now I'll summarize the three main points offered that I will offer here. Hopefully they will be useful to reflect and refocus our debate on art artists and humanitarians or humanity as we have done over the past four sessions and first I focus on the role of artists and art in the context of humanitarian settings. So artistic expressions can have a wide range of functions for the individual and for the collectives in society, not pleased during violent conflict and oppression. Artists play a central role in periods of uncertainty and liminality as commentators of events producers of particular certainties through folklore and propaganda but also as inspirators for change. As I said national governments they are very happy to use also artists and promote certain type of art to confirm their political goals and discourses and kind of rebuild ideas of what national culture is and identity. Yet art and I think all the artists that we've listened to assume the art that they've engaged with is also a space of for resistance and resilience during the times of oppression and conflict and kind of humanitarian settings and this is where our interest lies really as much as these themes of resistance and resilience are complicated and problematic and contested. Creative practice may also provide the space for individual and collective self-expression and that's important to remember. It is that also came the discussion of Baula today who's talking about different ways of viewing the everyday life and the situation of humanitarian settings. Life continues otherwise. It is not only about crisis and suffering. There are also joys, there are also births, there are also marriages, there's also divorces, there's also celebrations and there is also crime. It is important that we also document those moments and artists are very good at seeing the little things of everyday life that make the whole. So it may be seen as the only space open for resistance in repressive contexts or the best way to bring marginalization and injustice into focus. It can contribute to the process of individual and collective coming to terms with human consequences of violent conflict, displacement, war, genocide and so on. But it is also important to remember that there is this aesthetic nature of art even in the context of humanitarian settings and there's also an importance of creating art for its own sake, for the artistic sake. And I think what is interesting to note is that in the 1960s in the 1970s to be called an artist who was called a political artist or doing political art was highly problematic whereas now for many artists to prove that they just do art is actually highly problematic because highly difficult because very often we tend to politicize all different types of artistic responses in the contemporary art practice. It is important to remember that in the context of humanitarian settings or humanitarian situations producing beauty through art it's also a form of living in the country. So for example in the context of Sarajevo one of the musicians who played on the ruins of the city they said music reminds us that there is life we want for humanity beyond degradation beauty beyond eagerness therefore creative practice is also for many a way of life in violent conflict and displacement a way to deal with it to live through it. Now I turn to number two art and artists as transformers and we talked about it especially today the kind of impact that they might produce while art opens many possibilities knowing, provoking and challenging it's transformative powers even though they might be quite powerful at the individual level and at the structural level I think at the societal level they are much more problematic and overstated the change doesn't happen only through art unfortunately it has to happen in dialogue with other structures of power and I think this is where the link with humanitarian settings is extremely important with humanitarian organizations that very often have that power to negotiate certain changes in the society this assumption about artists as transformers and artists transformative also assumes in a certain way that all of us have the same capacity as audience and the same cyber affair to read art in the same way what is however powerful about art is its endless possibilities of interpretation and these interpretations come from the situated knowledge of each of us as a spectator, as an audience as a reader, as a viewer as someone who experiences the art seeing through the social and cultural frames that shaped our identities and ways of seeing, feeling and experiencing art another question is what type of transformation do we imagine when we talk about art as a transformative potential artistic practices has a great potential to relate to space and time and transform them both but how to transform the structures of power that actually bear up in art because of humanitarian suffering of humanitarian crisis of conflicts and so on so that cannot I argue that there has to be so just to go to point number three which is the link between humanitarianism and art but also the danger of using art and the danger of representation in the humanitarian context so we see between humanitarianism and this critical and political art that we've talked about with human values with issues that refer to humanity with universal values that relate to what humanity is and in this way the two are linked as having often at its core humanity rather than individual dimension art and human terms are at the same time both also not mutual they are both political fields and they place within concrete political context they are also influenced and thus transformed by this context therefore while some artists might be radical agents for change they are far from floating agents I think Anika talked about this kind of possibility of artists as floating apolitical and having this total freedom but the reality of it is that there are artists also producing these very concrete settings that are driven by money, by politics by economic interests or by influence by privilege third point the link between humanitarianism and art both art and humanitarianism have to do with representation and the complexities of this and we've discussed it at length who has a voice to speak on behalf of whom who can represent whom and in what way and both contemporary art and humanitarianism have opened up the participatory processes and practices community based protection for example or participatory art projects co-creation of cultural work to overcome some of the pairs of representation but I think there is more that we can learn especially from the artistic practice so some dangers in using art in humanitarian settings as our contributors to this sometimes warned us and I think we have to keep them in mind when we talk about the possibilities humanitarian contexts have responded to great potential of art as a healing tool however this is a sort of reductionist and utilitarian view of art and using it in a given context as a remedy so we have to think wider than that art is not only for healing but it has all these other aspects of creative imagination and knowing otherwise so while there is a need to rethink the role of arts in addressing and representing humanity and disaster challenges and obstacles facing the work of art in humanitarian contexts and the role of art in contributing to the long-term process of transforming relationships healing wounds, seeking justice and fostering human flourishing need to be carefully considered often art and artists in humanitarian settings are in those in context situations who have faced oppression and violence see art as a way to exist a way to stay alive a way to stay human in such extremely dehumanizing conditions and for me I think what this what it shows is the skull of artists and art and I would stress that as the quest for ethics of recognition through artistic practice therefore there is a need for this ethical response that recognizes the subjects that are narrating these accounts the ethical response that comes from the human term setting but also from the human term organizations but also those in positions of power that are causing such human term disasters so to conclude what are the possibilities what are the points of reflection and refocusing as one of the contributors to the symposium said art is seen very often as non-essential but therefore is essential and the power of art to capture the otherwise invisible to imagine the impossible and to really live in the humanity in the sea of humanity as Paula said and as Luis Carlos Tavarro also emphasized in his talk today that art cannot be separated from humanity art can offer a room for reflection and refocusing ideas ways of being and connecting particular events to wider moral and societal values and norms it is a way to comment on the society and offers a critical stance it opens up a space of knowing otherwise through different senses not only through the side and this is sort of against enlightenment debate of artists as visionaries but in terms of going beyond the vision work that engages a multiplicity of senses not just side including all the five senses to trigger our intuition, our minds, our imaginations this can offer a different way of knowing and a different way of addressing issues related to human tiredness in this way art can potentially offer what in today's presentation as an era called transformative learning again this transformative learning does not take place in the apolitical situation and art is not a apolitical solution in itself and therefore artists should not be seen as the substitutes of humanitarian workers the role in the society in many ways is very different than that of artists neither art nor humanitarian work are apolitical as we say and they take place in concrete settings in the context but these contexts need to be considered when the transformative learning is taken from the individual to the societal and then structural levels yet art has a role in the society but it cannot substitute the role of the state responsibilities towards the elevation of suffering and resolution of conflicts and it should neither be seen as a tool to achieve that in this way we risk to strip on the one hand the artists from their own sense of creative selves and put a large burden on them in resolving these very complicated issues but also reduce the opportunities that we have in wider possibilities of interpretation in artistic work in wider possibilities of imagining so I think that is key is how through art and linking it to the humanitarian settings we can produce, engage we can engage otherwise learn otherwise, remember otherwise imagine otherwise and potentially lead to a change a change that has to come in a dialogue between artists and humanitarians but also the authorities and wider societal institutions it has to come also from the co-production of knowledge and this and the great potential to offer a different type of reading, feeling, experiencing art not only to open the wounds but also how to go beyond visual representation of suffering to imagine alternatives I think that's a great potential of art for humanitarians but it is also linked to the responsibility of humanitarian organizations as well as the states that cannot be replaced by the artistic practice so I'll finish here and I look forward to the discussion thank you very much good evening everybody and welcome to the live section of our symposium the fourth session art and humanity which is possible we've had a fantastic session today with really outstanding speakers whom I'm very happy to welcome this evening Afshan Hoya, Paola Forjone Luis Carlos Tovar Anka Tarzina Grabska I'm also happy to say hello to my colleagues Philippe Stoll and Julie Enkel-Julia so to this theme was impacting I can only say that it has had a huge impact on me to listen to you and to appreciate the diversity of your experiences and points of view I would like to open up a conversation with all of you really on different points I had in mind during the different presentations and I would really like to thank you Katarizina for giving such a very clear and detailed overview of our conversations so far one theme I'd like to just throw out there and let you approach it as you wish is the question of safe space and context we've talked a lot about the transformative aspects of art how it can trigger change or how it can change you and what are the limits of this concept I would be curious to hear you on this idea of the space or the context in which you are inspired for such a transformative experience to occur and I guess the second point related to this and which I invited to approach is the question of vulnerability I'm thinking a lot about this theme in my profession as a museum director and I think there is such incredible power in acknowledging vulnerability and I'm thinking about this of course in the context of transformative learning but also in the context of your work in the field if it's regarding the people you are connected with or your own vulnerability and also of course we scatter us sharing your vulnerability with a very broad audience so these two aspects the safe space had recreated and the question of vulnerability in this process I don't know who would like to start of course I'm looking at you but actually I was going to say me if that's okay you hear me yes thank you for actually asking that question because there were two things I wanted to bring up that I didn't bring up in my talk and I think they can be very much linked to safe space and vulnerability the first thing is for transformation and perspective transformation to happen is the importance of actually confronting misconceptions and this confrontation can actually lead to subjective reframing which can then lead to perspective transformation in order to do this first of all you obviously have to be in a safe space in a space where people feel comfortable expressing themselves or confronting their own within themselves individually their own views and the other thing I wanted to bring up was the importance of negative emotions when information or when for instance you're being confronted with a misconception you possibly had and you're trying to reassess well what is it I really think now what is my view my perception now is to go into that vulnerable space and then the negative emotions will come up so the safe space is essential and there are different ways to make a safe space I focus very much on taking away hierarchy and authority that's often my way of creating a safe space and making sure that everyone gets heard and everyone is allowed to be equal and reach mental as well so Luis Carlos and Paula how do you create this safe space in your practice how do you think of that maybe Luis Carlos I see you have your mind calm no for me for me really it was by total accident I think you have all this sensibility when you work in art you are like you're open to to hear the other and maybe this is the first step to to begin to begin to understand to hear the other but at the same time you're hearing yourself so it's like it's always like exchange and the vulnerability is to put you in this in this system where you have your own fears and you are seeing and hearing the fear of the other so it's a complex situation for me it's like it's a very confusing situation because you cannot compare a doctor if you talk about humanitarian and a humanist so what is the difference between both and how you can like a difference between preserving life is first then is another issue so so for me as an artist we work more in the metaphor and in the we use language as a possible tool to resolve this or to talk about this vulnerability but it's quite different I don't know how to well I'll take it from there Luis Carlos and I'll turn to Paola and to Philip as well because in your presentation Paola you were talking in a kind of simultaneous way of these two moments preserving and saving life and creating I'll be curious to hear you more on this topic because it was fascinating to me how you were very humble in a certain way to express that humanitarian workers need artists and perhaps you can elaborate on that yes definitely so I feel that often people perceive humanitarian workers as heroes as very strong people but in fact we are not machines when you are in the field you are often overwhelmed with frustration, with sadness, with anger because of what you see around you but also because of the some circumstances of your life maybe you are far from your family and so you are in a situation where you are very very vulnerable and for me it was precisely this vulnerability that created this inside space for art to come into my life hadn't I had that vulnerability maybe I wouldn't have found that space, I wouldn't have had that need to listen to the artist to learn from them to finding them answers that I couldn't find in my briefings you know and so for me it was really also by accident that this experience that art came into into my life but this vulnerability and the presence of art in my life was actually an opportunity of I would say even personal growth in my life as a humanitarian thank you I'll listen to you Phillip now because I'm looking forward to your perspective on this and I do know you also have a question for Paula so I'll hand over the floor to you well I don't have much to add I think what Paula described is something that I totally relate and I don't need to add anything but maybe also I think art has this value which is also life saving in a way it's maybe not from a medical perspective but from a sanity perspective and we know that in situations where and this has been explained over the past sessions that you know moving on the verge of becoming and not being capable to live through a difficult situation is very thin and art is there to help you to stay on your feet and to or to carry on or to see some way of hope or way to express yourself and I think this is I think a field of work that we need to further dig and continue and we have been discussing already to how to go from this first symposium to something different and maybe that's the link I can make to the question I have for Paula when you were in the field what was the missing elements for you to further explore that interaction or that now you have gone through this symposium or this reflection are there things that you have that you think that were missing and maybe this question can be also for artists what is missing for a better collaboration because this will feed us Julie Pascal and myself to continue to carry on on this reflection and bring better these two worlds together Thank you that is a very good question I think that I felt very lonely in the field in my interest for art it was like my extravagant hobby and so my colleagues were perceiving it as you know she's into art it's a bit funny but they didn't see the relationship that we are all talking about today so I developed this interest quite lonely and then through the years I met Pascal I met you Philip and I felt like an institutional framework in my engagement with art and this has also made me feel confident in a sense like what I was feeling it actually makes sense there is actually a connection between humanitarians and humanitarian world and art it was not my feeling I like to think that we are together in this process of thinking how art and the humanitarian world can work together so I really welcome activities, roundtables experiences like the one that you have organized with with external partners to the ICRC well thank you for that I will definitely continue and Luis Carlos in the many social questions that you have addressed in your work in your home country and also abroad you have surely had numerous occasions to work with humanitarian workers or to interact with humanitarian workers from your perspective what was missing in this relationship or how do you feel humanitarian workers saw you as an artist contributing to a more complex situation how do you see your relationship with as an artist for me as I said I was very curious about and I saw the importance to work at that moment in Italy with the crisis of the refugees in 2014-2015 and also in Colombia I worked with displaced people and for me has been quite a challenge to hear and to work with them because I didn't as I said it was like yes I don't know how to explain this I'm sorry not just some not for me artists are sensitive to all kind of situations and the place you go you get involved into the context and but for me in a personal point of view I believe the humanitarian action is beyond art in itself I cannot compare the work of an artist compared to a doctor that wants to preserve life so in this in this context for me art is just a tool we can be a tool to help in this because art can be knowledge but before it's communication so we can really create like a link and a communication process in a situation in a very difficult situation and I started in this because I wanted to decentralize as a human being but also as an artist to decentralize myself in these situations and it totally changed my point of view of my work of the way I did art before and I think that's a clue in this conversation to decentralize meaning as in the first conversation with Afshan she was talking about the human condition may understood but negotiating this realliation of meanings and this is very important we have to decentralize ourselves and the meaning of things and to expand this idea of even what it's art it's a very confusing word and sometimes problematic you know so these borders have to be sometimes just we go beyond the meaning of this you had this beautiful quote art does not change anything it changes you which is a very good reminder in this conversation and certainly adopting a multi-disciplinary approach is it couldn't be more relevant in this conversation I'd like to ask you if you are still with us I think you are you are wonderful I have a question for you you were you were explaining very clearly in a very relevant way how art basically is not enough even if it might have a transformative power we have to look at the broader picture and the bigger overwhelming structures of society all together and how they connect I'll be just curious to ask you how you see the museum in this conversation what potential do you associate with the museum and perhaps might also ask this question on behalf of Julie presenting here the art and design university in Geneva how do you see schools and training centres in this conversation yes I think that's another very relevant question to this discussion because as we said it cannot really stop at the level of individual experiences and I think it would also undermine the potential that both fields have for this I think the museums and we've had these discussions with you Pascal directly in relation to other projects the museums play a very important role because they are the sites of knowledge of presumed knowledge authoritarian knowledge and they produce a certain representation and I think thinking about museums any kind of museums but then thinking specifically about the museum like the museum of the red crescent you have an amazing power to actually shape the debate shape the discussion so by opening up the possible ways that interpretation of what is in the museum and what is displayed in the museum how it is displayed how it is communicated who comes to the museum who has the right to voice their opinion I think it's key and this again I think that goes back to the point that Luis Carlos just made about decentralizing it's also about decentralizing what we think about what museum expertise is and who produces that expertise and I think for a very long time thinking about the museum of the red crescent I always had this imagination of a museum where there's a lot of the humanitarian perspective in it whereas bringing other perspectives doesn't mean that the humanitarian perspective is not relevant in fact it's exactly the opposite opening up to multiple ways of reading the exhibition and this is what I also talked about a little bit in the concluding remarks I think as viewers each of us has such very different experiences very different situated knowledges so how we read art how I read what for example you know for example the exhibition of Luis Carlos presents comes also from my own personal experiences I read it through that that also relates to the point of transformative learning that that aspan mentioned so I think the museums have a tremendous tremendous potential to shape the larger debates and to make the debates more collective you know and more institutional and that also relates to the universities there has been now a trend of having these studies that relate to artists social you know for social justice and kind of opening up this debate and I think that's very very useful but I think we have to again go a little bit not only stop in these debates that has to be a link to and I think that also happens slowly in the university in Geneva where you're connecting these art projects to real life situations but not only to real life experiences but also to the institutions that then have a power over these lives so bringing into conversation I think the universities have power to do that universities are seen as apolitical though they are highly political but they have the power to bring different institutions different individuals, individuals in power into the conversation and bring this more bottom-up knowledge this kind of community-based knowledge to wider discussions and I think that's a forum that has to be used and we have to be also brave to use it because these are not easy discussions and we go against the political discourse right? Well let's be brave and let's use it and let's see this as the beginning of a conversation we will end this first conversation here and definitely look forward to continuing to explore these connections between art and human action and other shapes and formats we are planning a publication to conclude this international symposium and I would really like to thank now my partners in crime Philippe Stoll and Julien and Kelle Julia with whom we've had the most fascinating debates and a wonderful collaborative experience that brought us here today so thank you so much so to Pierre-Antoine Poissard who did a great job at producing and coordinating the entire symposium it wasn't an easy thing to do so thank you to him and thank you also to Cécile Yesrahaes who recently joined the team and who's been tweeting reposting, sharing knowledge nuggets that have come out of this wonderful conversation so thank you again to all our speakers today and I can only say see you soon thank you very much, goodbye Bye, thank you