Determining Domain (2012-13)
Sanaz Mazinani
Redacted March #1, 2011
From the series Frames of the Visible
Pigment print
Mazinani presents work from Frames of the Visible, a series of large-scale digital collages that re-mediate images gathered online. In several of the pieces from the series, Mazinani reconfigures photos obtained from a database of hundreds of previously secret images of American casualties returning to honor guard ceremonies from the Afghanistan and Iraq wars. The database, also known as “War Casualty Homecoming Images,” highlights the issue of whether these images are rightfully part of the American public record or should be kept classified by the U.S. military. In response to Freedom of Information Act requests and a lawsuit, the Pentagon made public more than 700 of these images in 2005. However, many of the images clearly show evidence of censorship, or as the Pentagon prefers to call it “redaction,” resulting in faces, features on equipment, and sections of uniforms being concealed with black bars, bringing forth the issue of who in fact owns the right to this imagery.
Determining Domain
November 7, 2012 – January 19, 2013
Intersection for the Arts
San Francisco, CA