Conflict in Technicolor: Richard Mosse extends his Congo series 'The Enclave' for his debut London show

'Thousands are Sailing', by Richard Mosse
'Thousands are Sailing', by Richard Mosse, is one of a series of portraits of the war-torn eastern Democratic Republic of Congo that make up the photographer's solo show at The Vinyl Factory
(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

War photography sits uneasily with fine art, but Richard Mosse's new installation at The Vinyl Factory Space in London combines straight reportage with an unworldly technical process. The end result is powerful, both in terms of the real story being told and the way in which the imagery lends an aura of the spectacular and unreal. As a result you are drawn closer into the unknown. 

The Enclave is ostensibly a work about the conflict in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Created in collaboration with the cinematographer Trevor Tweeten, using 16mm film and lumbering Steadicam equipment, a landscape of great beauty and danger is set out before the viewer. These films are enhanced by a technically advanced soundscape, created by Ben Frost, from field recordings made in North and South Kivu, the heart of the conflict. First shown at the Irish Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale, Mosse has expanded and extended the installation for his debut London show with The Vinyl Factory, inside Brewer Street Car Park, which now comprises of an eight-screen video installation, as well as large format photographic panels.

For the large scale imagery, Mosse has used Kodak Aerochrome, an infrared film originally developed for aerial reconnaissance during the Second World War (the company describes it as 'sometimes effective when used to photograph objects painted to imitate foliage... in the resulting colour infrared transparency, the areas of healthy deciduous foliage will be magenta or red, and the painted objects may be purple or blue'). The vividly rendered rainforest and vegetation is contrasted with the people in the centre of this ongoing catastrophic conflict, who look as if they have been transplanted onto another planet, displaced from reality.

This is, of course, exactly what has happened, with 5.4 million deaths since 1998 and countless displaced communities across the region. Mosse's work also makes the point that unlike other modern conflict zones, the heavily forested landscape seems to absorb all traces of violence, even though the very subjects of his images are the rebel enclaves and refugee camps that exist solely because of the fighting.

The video screens bring these environments to uneasy life. Using the same infrared processes, the footage transports us right there, in the heart of these tense and fractured communities, just as much observed by the subjects of the films as we observe them. Of course, there's a self-conscious irony in the use of a military technology to document a conflict zone. Yet the skewed aesthetic not only evokes the complexity of the conflict itself, but also forces us to look with fresh eyes upon an unjustly forgotten part of the world, whose problems and stories have been failed by conventional media.

The exhibition includes Mosse's multi-channel video installation

Installed inside The Vinyl Factory's Brewer Street Car Park building, the exhibition includes Mosse's multi-channel video installation that was originally commissioned for the Irish Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

Mosse has expanded and extended the installation for his new show

Mosse has expanded and extended the installation for his new show, which also includes large scale photographs, taken with a specialist infrared film. Pictured is 'Lost Fun Zone', 2012 

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

A image of mountain view

'Because the Night', 2012 

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

Stalemate', 2012

'Stalemate', 2012 

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

A image of mountain view

'At Home He's a Tourist', 2012 

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

'The Enclave' was produced in collaboration with cinematographer Trevor Tweeten

'The Enclave' was produced in collaboration with cinematographer Trevor Tweeten. With long tracking shots filmed with Steadicam on 16mm infrared film the videos are curiously disembodied from their subjects, presenting conflict in disorientatingly bright colours

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

The Enclave' is a recalibration of the traditions of photojournalism

Experimental and immersive, 'The Enclave' is a recalibration of the traditions of photojournalism

(Image credit: © Richard Mosse)

Jonathan Bell has written for Wallpaper* magazine since 1999, covering everything from architecture and transport design to books, tech and graphic design. He is now the magazine’s Transport and Technology Editor. Jonathan has written and edited 15 books, including Concept Car Design, 21st Century House, and The New Modern House. He is also the host of Wallpaper’s first podcast.