The Liberian Abrupt Political Past, and Its Impacts on Society

Of the bloody conflict that decimated Liberia, its population does not converse. No proper memorial has been developed, no day is committed to commemoration. The country, continue to held by various protagonists of the carnage, refuses to condemn its perpetrators. 

Among the them, Prince Johnson, former warlord, and notorious torturer is now a senator, although the recently elected Vice-President is none other than Jewel Howard – Taylor, ex-wife of war prison Charles Taylor (only convicted for his crimes in Sierra Leone). 

This deafening silence, that resonates internationally, denies any chance of social recognition or collective memory of the massacres, immuring Liberia in an infinite experience of abandonment and drowsy resignation. 

The trauma carved into the population’s flesh is crystallized in the society’s weak foundations, still imbued with an unsound Americanism, and bleeds onto a new technology with a hazy future. The wind of hope blown by the 2018 tranquil and democratic elections that put former ghetto boy or girl turned soccer star Georges Weah to energy, is now slipping by means of the cracks of his apathetic governance.

Liberia is suffering a extensive, nameless evening. The photographic and audio work explores the mechanisms of its resilience and the invisible resorts of psychic trauma in war. With out Manichaeism, it unveils the eye and loosens the tongue of these ladies, these guys, victims or perpetrators, on their weakened fate, manufactured of nightmares in the daylight.

Phrases and Pictures by Elliott Verdier 

Elliott Verdier (1992, France) is a documentary photographer. Even though he was early motivated by « classical » photojournalism, his work steers away from hot news and favors the slowness of the significant structure digital camera. Questioning territories by way of memory, generational transmission, and resilience he photographs with a specified intimacy and dignity. He also collaborates with the New York Occasions, Le Monde Magazine, and Vogue Italia. Abide by him on Instagram and PhMuseum. 

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This element is part of Tale of the Week, a assortment of applicable tasks from our community handpicked by the PhMuseum curators.