TV3 News
January 22, 2008
An exhibition in Wellington is raising the profile of a country half a world away.
For over forty years Burma has been governed by a strict military dictatorship, notorious for ethnic cleansing, torture and the daily destruction of rural villages.
They changed the country's name to Myanmar in 1989.
The exhibition hopes to show the plight of the Burmese and raise money for those who need it most.
''Displaced Burma" is an exhibition giving a voice to people who don't have one.
“The generals and the military don't allow them that freedom, so we need to give them a voice. As friends we need to raise awareness of what is really going on in their country,” says Shelly Mansfield, the exhibition organiser, from Children on the Edge.
The exhibition features 30 works by Burmese artist Saw Cu Cil, who like one and a half million others fled to neighbouring Thailand desperate to escape persecution in Burma, where accounts of forced labour, destruction of villages and torture, are common.
“Probably one of the most horrific is using them as human mine sweepers to track the mines, and the way in which they do that, of course, is by standing on them,” says Mansfield.
Burma, renamed "the union of Myanmar'' in 1989 has been under strict military rule since 1962.
Opposition groups refuse to recognize the legitimacy of the ruling government, and won't adopt the new name.
The country's tumultuous past came to a head last year when monks led pro-democracy demonstrations, now known as "the saffron revolution," and many died for the cause.
Sher Nay Moo and her family are Burmese refugees.
They have been in New Zealand for eight months.
“I miss my mum,” cries Sher Nay Moo, a Burmese Refugee, as she looks at a painting by Saw Cu Cil of a bridge in Burma.
She used to cross the very same bridge every day to visit her mother, who is still in Burma.
The image is a bitter sweet reminder of her homeland.
Displacement is a way of life there...
“You will also see pictures of the internally displaced running and that is literally what they have to do. Their villages are attacked and burnt down and the people run and hide in the jungle,” says Mansfield.
In the last week the exhibition has raised around $16,000.
The money will help create a safe environment for the children of Burma and facilitate the most basic human right - a chance at life.
For more information or to buy prints or make a donation go to www.childrenontheedge.org.nz
No comments:
Post a Comment