Blancs de mémoire (Rwanda), 2013

HD video projection (60 minutes)

Loop of 2 minutes 46 seconds

Edition of 3

The title Blancs de mémoire refers to the book by Georges Anglade, a Haitian intellectual exiled in Montréal who perished in the 2010 earthquake. It features a photograph of Ugandan refugees turned away at the Rwandan border of Kagitumba in 1982.

In this video montage, this disturbing yet enigmatic image, swept by the perpetual movement of the waves, confronts us with the denial and abandonment to which so many populations are subject and the recollection of which gradually fades from Western memory. This work echoes a video installation presented as part of a group exhibition, À Montréal quand l’image rôde, presented at Le Fresnoy (Studio national des arts contemporains in France) in 2013-2014.