A Visual History of the Arab-Israeli Peace Process (ongoing)

This project looks at the tragic history of a well-intentioned, yet ill-fated peace process that seems to have become little more than the flipside of an intractable conflict rather than a vehicle for delivering a true and lasting peace. While successfully negotiating a comprehensive resolution to the Arab-Israeli conflict has always been the stated goal, the peace process has become little more than a reactionary tool of ceaseless conflict management as each crisis drives the two sides further and further apart.

Using a mix of original and historically relevant imagery, this series visually explores the diplomatic history of the Arab-Israeli peace process. Beginning with the Balfour Declaration the images represent the reams and reams of various ceasefires, UN Resolutions, peace treaties, speeches, etc. that have gone into shaping the conflict throughout its history. The visual glitches seen in all of the images are the result of digitally integrating the text from a specific historical document with the individual image itself.

The resulting images take a more distant, third party approach to exploring the conflict and its aftermath. As an American, whose own government is deeply tied to the successes and failures of the peace process, it is important to have an understanding of our own role in the region. Overall, the visual distortions in each of the images represent the peace processes own failings. After the step forward of each diplomatic breakthrough, the hope that is generated eventually falls apart as the conflict inevitability reignites. Yet the peace process continues to move forward having become an end in itself rather than a means to an end.

Judean Hills/Balfour Declaration, 1917. The letter from Lord Balfour to Lord Rothschild, declaring that the British government “view with favor” the establishment of a Jewish National Home in Palestine.

Judean Hills/Balfour Declaration, 1917. The letter from Lord Balfour to Lord Rothschild, declaring that the British government “view with favor” the establishment of a Jewish National Home in Palestine.

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