Creating democracy: a dialogue with Krzysztof Wodiczko - Interview - Cover Story

Phillips: How do we create a physicality in cities that accepts, accommodates, and advances different kinds of memories?

Wodiczko: How do we embody concepts of memory that will lead to change? How do we reach a point where there will be no need for tragic memorials? How do we undo certain cultural patterns, certain readings of the past?

Phillips: When did this inquiry into the posttraumatic enter your work? And if always implicitly there, how and why did it become more explicit?

Wodiczko: There is a society of wounded people that must be addressed rather than overlooked. And I believe that I must be an agent who can contribute to this process of change. At one time, because of the threat or fear of political consequences, individuals were forced to be silent. Now they can attempt to speak without fear. They can speak on behalf of potential victims, as well as to perpetrators of violence. The silence is ended. They have achieved a way to speak to both victors and victims.

The theories of Mouffe and Foucault must be connected with trauma therapy concepts. A person to add to this growing list of references is Judith Lewis Herman, who wrote Trauma and Recovery. (11) She is a psychoanalyst and practicing therapist who works primarily with survivors of rape and sexual violence. She is interested in the relationship of social justice and therapy. Her understanding of the stages of recovery, if not explicitly about a democratic process, suggests the kind of work that must be done for people to become fearless speakers in public space.

It is precisely those who have had traumatic experiences who should speak first. But they are the ones who cannot. So the political and ethical must be connected with psychological and sociological agendas. Posttraumatic stress therapy can never eliminate individual or cultural trauma, but it enables individuals and society to live with it.

Rather than a theoretical inquiry, like in the work of Jacques Lacan, for example, this must be pursued in a practical way. People need help to regain their memory and speech in order to become active members of society. Herman suggests that moving from self-examination and private testimony to engagement and public testimony is a key part of the recovery process. I am not speaking in a clinical way, but this is an issue of personal healing that connects to a vision of society's health.

This interest began when I first worked with immigrants. Strangers. It became clear that the operators, users, and performers of the instruments that I make use them to negotiate their inner lives with the outside world. For example, the Alien Staff has a number of functions. These speaking/walking sticks with their personal reliquaries, monitors, and recordings are a user's double. They can be used as therapeutic devices, as well as implements to participate in a democracy. The instruments provoke an exchange of opinions. The entire process of prerecording, speaking, recording, and editing required for the Alien Staff and other instruments is not unlike the stages of posttraumatic therapy. The process of editing turns speech into a manageable scope and form that is available to anyone.