Congratulations to everyone for their contributions to the White Night debate ‘Make Love Not War!’. This event was a great success. Devised and planned jointly by students of the Critical Fine Art Practice course at the University of Brighton and the Visual Culture Society of Sussex University with myself, it took place in the University of Brighton gallery at Grand Parade in Brighton in amongst the images of Iraq and Vietnam that make up the exhibition ‘Iraq through the lens of Vietnam’ one of the Brighton Photo Biennial exhibitions that make up the War of Images, Images of War biennial curated by Julian Stallabrass. White Night is a new event in Brighton that celebrates putting the clocks back by many venues staying open until the early hours, with all sorts of things happening.
The premise of the debate was to test the proposition ‘Make Love Not War’ and I was billed to chair the event. From the start I had wanted to give the event to students to lead in order for them to experience facilitating a public discussion of politics within the Institution that is a university. I was interested in what form their political energies take and how they get to be exercised currently.
Esther started proceedings by leading a hand-holding activity which ended with half the group outside the gallery on the street and the other half inside the gallery and the two rows of us facing each other through the glass. I found this strangely moving. We were like two factions or like two different species examining each other. And the holding of hands created an instant connection and awareness of our interdependence as people.
The second part of the event had people talking to people they hadn’t met before about issues relating to war and peace prompted by keywords chosen by Luska and presented by Lucy. Everyone was talking at once, animatedly, in pairs. This was followed by a viewing of videos made by Thomas Blatchford, aka The Thomas Ferguson Band, consisting of excerpts of interviews, imagery and film relating to questions around war, aesthetics and ethics. A debate rounded off the evening with Thomas taking a lead in prompting the discussion and opinions getting quite heated at one point, which made the event exciting and the issues come alive.
Nothing was settled, no resolution was forthcoming, no motions were passed. Instead various arena were opened up as possible spaces for debate and the smorgasbord of activities kept the event lively and stimulating.
