viz.

Image credit: legofesto via Boing Boing

John Jones sent along a link to this image, from the work of a photographer who documents events in the "war on terror" with Lego dioramas. (I have an earlier post on viz. on a somewhat similar subject, an artist who used Legos to create depictions of the Holocaust.)

I'm ultimately not quite sure what to make of the sculptures. On the one hand, the childlike qualities evoked by Lego bricks provide an unsettling contrast with the events depicted, and the potential alienation of subject from matter that consequently arises may be effective in spurring reflection on the questions raised by the use of torture. In particular, the modular nature of Lego blocks (mass produced so that any two random blocks will fit together) may be emblematic of the programmatic nature of the torture regime instituted by the U.S. Although it is tempting to write off torture as an aberration, an exceptional situation that can be explained away by reference, for example, to human evil or to the actions of only an unauthorized few, in fact, as the recently released torture memos show, torture was an organized and systemic practice. It emerged from specifically defined contexts and practices and was authorized through familiar bureaucratic channels: it was, in fact, given the stamp of legality and legitimacy by officials in the Bush administration. The components were already in place; all that was lacking was a willingness on the part of those in charge to (forgive the facility of the analogy) put the pieces in place. What is most shocking about the torture regime was not its aberrational nature but the ease with which it emerged in its context.

On the other hand, the alienating effects of the project may, for some, remain problematic, as if treating such serious subjects with such childlike objects--toys--trivializes serious and systemic human rights abuses. I have a little more on that line of argument in my earlier post.