The graves are nice this time of year
The graves are nice this time of year places embedded, traditional forms of commemoration and remembrance in a different light, brings forgotten elements to the surface and introduces new avenues. The photographs encourage reflection on commemoration and remembrance of the First World War, and also bring this memory to life.
“Portray the commemorative landscape of the First World War in Flanders, and simultaneously expand and question it.” This was the assignment that photographer Jimmy Kets received from the Flemish Peace Institute, the Flemish Parliament and the Council of the Flemish Community Commission on the occasion of the First World War Centenary commemoration. Everyone can recall a number of iconic WWI monuments or locations in Flanders Fields, but the entire country is actually strewn with traces of the war or its commemoration and remembrance. The traces are great and small, striking or forgotten, overexposed or practically ignored. The landscape of remembrance activities is also highly diverse: from ceremonies to politically charged events and from personal mourning to re-enactments. All of this tells us truthfully and ineluctably how many different, and occasionally contradictory ways we commemorate and remember today.
Similar situations can also be identified in the Goriška territory. Throughout the land, on both sides of the Italian-Slovenian border, there are in fact several monuments, cemeteries, remains of trenches and other testimonies of the First World War. That is why Goriški muzej decided to host the itinerant exhibition of Belgian photographer Jimmy Kets. Two territories so different and distant are linked by common stories - past and present.
The graves are nice this time of year places embedded, traditional forms of commemoration and remembrance in a different light, brings forgotten elements to the surface and introduces new avenues. The photographs encourage reflection on commemoration and remembrance of the First World War, and also bring this memory to life. In other words, the exhibition gives us an alternative, innovative and dynamic vision of the commemoration of the Great War.
Together with his career as a press photographer for De Standaard and De Morgen, Jimmy Kets (1979) is also known for his personal series such as Brightside, Hotel Kets and Niet Miss.
On the occasion of the First World War Centenary, with this solo exhibition Kets takes the next step in the development of his work.
Location: Kromberk Castle
From:
3 Dec 2018
Till:
24 Mar 2019
author of the exhibition: Jimmy Kets
curator: Katarina Brešan