Bullet

2021 - Film & Video (Film & Video)
10:00 minutes (looped)

Maya Watanabe’s video installation Bullet unfolds within the context of the Peruvian justice and forensic systems. During the Peruvian internal armed conflict that occured between the subversive group Sendero Luminoso (Shining Path) and the Peruvian military from 1980-2000, approximately 21,000 people, civilians, and guerilla fighters were killed. Most of the killings that were perpetrated by the military during this period of political upheaval were later deemed extrajudicial acts, and almost all of them were carried out with firearms. To evade any potential judicial proceeding against the military, the victims were hidden or disappeared to avoid their identification. Many remains have been found since the conflict, but have not been identified, pending under the status “N. N.”, meaning “No Name”. Resulting from a collaboration with the Peruvian Forensic Archaeologist team, Watanabe’s video documents one of the unclaimed bodies. Specifically, the video examines a bullet wound in the skull of an unidentified person killed by the Peruvian Armed Forces in 1986. The video is an indictment of these extrajudicial killings and a critique of the corruption and negligence that has led to so many unresolved cases. Bullet is an attempt to reconsitute the cultural and political significance of these erased murders, in the hopes that more cases will be solved so that the families and civilians affected by the conflict can mourn appropriately and see through the healing process.

Drawing on her background in theater design and direction, Maya Watanabe is known for her multi-channel video installations that explore the relationship between language, collectivity, identity, and space. Considering words, silences and the interweaving of the two, her videos are often slow, controlled, and cyclical in nature. Earlier works incorporate references and methodologies from cinematographic language, often involving one or several actors performing a script and interacting with the camera through choreographed movements. The texts narrated by the actors are either borrowed quotes from movies or modified poems and scripts, which become untethered when taken out of their original context. The ambiguity and lack of narrative that results reveals the imprecise nature of perception and the images and memories that we rely to construct identity. Recent works examine the landscape, exploring their tendency towards the fantastical and ability to conjure memories. With particular attention to the legacy and history of Peru, her work considers the fragmented, uprooted, and mutable past of a place, and how issues of historical instability can take centuries to resolve.

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