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THE BELFAST MAZE
Photographs by Donovan Wylie
Film by Amanda Dunsmore
15 February - 23 July 2006
For 24 years, the Maze
Prison played a unique role in the Northern Ireland conflict, ultimately
coming to symbolize that period in the country’s history.
Built in 1976 to
hold terrorists and political prisoners, the Maze
is an extreme example of rational design. It was laid out on a gigantic
scale for the systematic isolation of detainees and maximum security.
This did not prevent the prison from witnessing numerous scenes of
violence, hunger strikes and mass break-outs in which several detainees
and warders died.
The implementation of the Good Friday Agreement resulted in the prison’s
closure in 2000. The question marks that have since hung over the
future of the site attest to Northern Ireland’s difficulties in coming
to terms with its recent past.
In 2002, Magnum photographer Donovan Wylie, himself
Irish, obtained the exclusive right to take pictures of the entire
prison complex, without limits or supervision. His 68 photographs
document the repetitive nature of the architecture and its disorienting
effect. They speak of the psychological impact of incarceration in
this labyrinthine prison.
The film Billy's Museum, by English artist Amanda
Dunsmore, tells the story of day-to-day life within the prison.
Her view of the objects confiscated over the years gives a human dimension
to imprisonment and the detainees’ world, in which internal fighting
contrasts with the need to escape.
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