Demonstrating the ability and disruptive power of photography, Gilles Peress

challenges the underlying causes of global complacency and ignorance through the

use of photographic journalism. A professor of human rights and photography and a

senior researcher at the Human Rights Center at Berkeley, Gilles Peress works with a

strong sense of moral responsibility. Together with his background in political science

and philosophy, Peress presents a given purpose of raising awareness of global

issues like the events that occurred in Rwanda through his photographic lens. In an

effort to challenge and stretch the viewer’s comprehension of human violence and

one’s suffering, he published, The Silence, composed of photographs to provide a form

of documentation regarding the Rwandan genocide. The Rwandan genocide, between

the country’s Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups, left hundreds of thousands dead and just

as many exiled and homeless, all in a matter of a hundred days. The country’s Hutu-

led government released fatal orders against the Tutsi minority. The killing was done in

most cases using machetes or clubs and by the hand of someone they knew. Peress

alerts the readers to the unfathomable horror of the genocide while also leaving a

sense of ambiguity with regards to the perpetrators of the conflict. Peress targets the

viewer’s indifference to the victims, disconnected from their comfortable and safe lives.

Through the use of numerous platforms Peress was able to magnify exposure and

further implant the disturbing reality of the conflict upon a global scale.

The Silence displays a relentless composition of unsettling images that in design, take

the viewer on a chronological journey. The Silence begins with the words, “A prisoner,

a killer is presented to us, it is a moment of confusion, of fear, of prepared stories. He

has a moment to himself.” Turning the page, the first image consumes the entirety of

the double spread, containing the prisoner mentioned on the opening page. His gaze is

distant as he appears to stare blankly at the ground ahead, avoiding the camera. In the

act of avoiding eye contact, the man is communicating a sense of guilt or confusion

with the stare equating to a possible reference to post-traumatic stress as he detaches

himself from reality as a way of coping with the present. There is a continuity

throughout the book as the viewer is carried through the memories of the man as he

reflects on his participation in the genocide. On the last page of the book, the man is

seen again. The text shows the passage of three minutes before closing with the

haunting statement, ‘As I look at him, he looks at me.” Completely engaged with the

camera, the man looks directly into the lens with a seemingly possessed look of

anguish. In this portrayal, Peress incorporates photography's fragmentation and

narrative limitations, while encapsulating and maintaining what he has called “reality

itself.” In this way, Peress has also added a sense of narrative and structure to the

book which inspires a greater understanding and meaning for the readers.

The book is divided into three sections consisting of "The Sin," "Purgatory," and "The

Judgment," documenting the immediate aftermath of the genocide, the crowds of

refugees as they travel to Tanzania and Congo and the struggle within the refugee

camp, respectively. These titles denote a biblical reference and aid in demonstrating

Peress’s intention concerning each chapter. “The Sin” captures the weapons, the

dumped machetes and clubs piled upon one another in a chaotic manner, a graphic

reminder of the frenzied nature and intensity of suffering while also signifying the huge
scale of the genocide. It is in this chapter the reader is faced with the conflict itself. He

photographed men and women in varying states of decomposition, putting them in the

context of their surroundings. Peress also photographed the children as they lay

helplessly decimated alongside one another in classrooms and beside their parents

and families. In response to the photographs, the viewer draws on the universal

impulse to act on observed atrocity. He aims to enhance the power of emotional

appeal from his graphic content to inspire or provoke a reaction. It is through these

emotional reactions that he confronts global complacency as such acts are considered

to be the start in trying to understand and later prevent such wanton acts of violence.

After seeing interviews with the photographer, one might also conclude that this

chapter is a reference to the “indifference of the west” and additionally the act of

turning a blind eye to the conflict occurring in Rwanda. An induced sense of injustice is

therefore evoked as the viewer is confronted with the results of their own complicity

encapsulated within “The Sin.” In another interview where Peress talks about the role

of photography in the struggle for human rights, he stated that it allowed him to, “deal

with reality without using words.” He describes the purpose of his images as being able

to depict the inexplainable.

After bearing witness to artifacts symbolic of death, the next chapter “Purgatory” is a

suggestive reference to the process of facing consequence. Through the

documentation of the fleeing of the survivors and killers alike, Peress has captured the

moment they collectively turn their back and walk away from the visceral standpoint

captured from the photographer’s lens. The UN’s role to protect on the basis of a
global political commitment to end the worst forms of violence and persecution meant

that once labeled a genocide, they were required to assist in the intervention.

However, the US and French government officials spent time debating over

terminology because of the mentioned legal and moral obligation to respond and fear

for their own security. In their hesitation to use the term, “genocide” in replacement of

the phrase, “acts of genocide” in press conferences, executions were perpetual in

Rwanda. In July of 1994 at a State Department briefing, a reporter had asked a

spokesperson, “How many acts of genocide does it take to make genocide?” a

question to which the spokesman was not prepared to respond to. Although such

context is separated from the photos themselves, it soon became shared knowledge

through the numerous legal cases that followed. In a highly metaphorical sense, one

can grapple at the idea that the victims had given up hope following the global failure

to intervene and prevent the conflict. The viewer is therefore motivated to draw on an

awareness and ask of their own catharsis following the event, much like the

perpetrators themselves who are left fleeing amongst those they tried to kill.

The final chapter “The Judgement” reveals the harsh realities of life in the refugee

camps. In the majority of photos within this chapter, the subject’s gazes are not

directed at the camera but deflected off into the distance signaling the direction of

attention away from the viewer. These averted gazes trigger the re-orienting of the

viewers visuospatial attention away from the subject themselves and to their

surrounding environment and the gazed direction. Peress has also framed many

photographs as to position the central figures so that only part of their body is
captured. The subject seen in the photograph is therefore immersed in their

surrounding environment as the viewers’ attention is directed to not only to the scene

as a whole but to the fact that the frame itself is constricted. The photographs are

composed so that the viewer is left questioning and doubting and trying to understand

what is going on within the arrangement. The book consists of monochrome black and

white photographs which makes the viewer pause and look closely to focus on a

subject's and their emotional state. The edges of each page are also dyed black, a

symbolic reference to death and grief. Peress arranged stark monochromatic

photographs in a manner that motivates an engaging exploration.

The books title, The Silence, echoes the eerie peacefulness of the aftermath

shadowing the reserved global stance. It indicates Peress’s own understanding of the

situation faced by the Rwandans as the world was silent and did not speak up for

them. In the post-cold war era, there was a rise in a new kind of violence due to ethnic

turmoil and geopolitical imbalance with the ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia, the mass

rapes in the Congo and the genocide in Rwanda. These wars were under-reported in

the Western media, because they did not represent a challenge to Western interests, it

was a “not next door so why should I care’ mentality. The genocide initially received

little media attention as it was directed more towards the South African elections

following the end of apartheid and the upcoming world cup. The intention of The

Silence is to speak for the victims now by giving voice to their terrible suffering. In the

title, there is also an association between “silence” and “death” which became a central

image in activist campaigns against the AIDS pandemic around the same time with the
slogan “silence=death.” Peress is stressing the deadly effects of passivity in crises.

Peress has used his photographs as a medium to convey an expressive truth about

suffering to enhance peoples understanding and further challenge naivety.

Peress’s credibility as a photographer and social influence using magnus photos, is

advanced further with his coverage over credited media networks. Featuring in articles

of which include The New York Times, The New Yorker and the Natural Geographic to

name a few. From such publicity, Peress is able to contest any preconceptions

following the lack of knowledge and information available through his images that

retain an irrefutable truth. He is able to present the reality of human suffering, the basis

for formulating firm and coherent ideas of human rights. Peress uses photography to

enlighten the naïve and circulates it on platforms so that suffering and atrocity are not

rendered unseen and unknown.

In the hope that people will resonate and draw comparisons between their own lives

and the disorder displayed within the photographs, Peress captures the everyday

existence turned upside down of Rwandans following the genocide. The Silence being

a metaphoric reference to the way the genocide was reported around the world, is

empowering viewers to think and formulate questions based on knowledge of their own

life, delving deeper into understanding their own complicity and ignorance.