How To Dismantle a Bomb
American cluster bombs rained on Laos during the ‘Secret War’ from 1964 to 1973. During those years, a bomb fell on this small country every eight minutes on average; a total of 2 million tons of bombs. More than on Japan and Germany throughout the entire Second World War. Almost fifty years later, many areas are still not ammunition-free.
Marco Frauchiger’s work shows the surprising way in which the population deals with this legacy. Unexploded bombs are meticulously transformed into everyday utensils, jewellery and souvenirs. War material undergoes a contradictory transformation here. It becomes absurd when a man – mutilated because he stumbled on an unexploded bomb – can walk again thanks to a prosthesis made of bomb remnants. In search of artefacts and stories, Frauchiger collected film footage, conversations and images, which he compiled into a kind of performative book, ready to be filmed. ‘How to Dismantle a Bomb’ questions whether war material can be beautiful, without providing an answer.
“If I tell you that this necklace was made from bomb material, you just have to believe me.” (quote from the work)
