www.rencontres-arles.com/en/expositions/view/1531/debi-cornwall

Over the last decade, Debi Cornwall has been investigating the fictions fueling America’s idea of itself. Her vivid, formally composed color documentary photographs serve more to provoke than to inform, inviting a closer examination of how state power is performed, consumed, and normalized. 

This exhibition features two bodies of work representing two sides of the same coin. What are the stories power tells, the games it plays, to manage unsettling realities? Necessary Fictionsframes this question through the lens of immersive, realistic wargames. On ten military bases across the United States, Debi Cornwall documents mock-village landscapes in the fictional country of “Atropia” and its population, roleplayers who enact versions of their past or future selves in realistic training scenarios. Costumed Afghan and Iraqi civilians, many who fled war, now recreate it in the service of the U.S. military. Real soldiers preparing to deploy practice their possible futures as fighters or casualties of war.

在过去的十年里，Debi Cornwall一直在调查助长美国自我观念的虚构。她生动、正式构图的彩色纪录片照片更多的是为了挑衅而不是提供信息，邀请人们更仔细地研究国家权力是如何执行、消耗和正常化的。

本次展览展出了代表同一枚硬币两面的两件作品。权力讲述的故事是什么，它玩什么游戏，来管理令人不安的现实？Necessary Fictions通过沉浸式、现实的战争游戏的镜头来框定这个问题。在美国各地的十个军事基地，Debi Cornwall记录了虚构国家“Atropia”及其人口的模拟村庄景观，在现实的训练场景中表演过去或未来自我的角色扮演者。穿着服装的阿富汗和伊拉克平民，其中许多人逃离了战争，现在为美国军队服务。准备部署的真实士兵实践了他们作为战士或战争伤亡者可能的未来。