Transitional Justice is a term uttered across societies; the concept of creating a just peace as a means to a lasting peace. But what does this term, easily explained in academic and legal terms, mean ‘on the ground’? Transitional Justice is a term uttered across societies; the concept of creating a just peace as a means to a lasting peace. But what does this term, easily explained in academic and legal terms, mean ‘on the ground’? Balkan Diskurs correspondent Struan Kennedy sits down with two members of the ‘Transitions’ curatorial team to discuss the process behind making ‘transitional justice’ relatable and digestible to audiences around the world. ‘Transitions’ is a multimedia photography exhibition that explores the journeys of transitional justice in conflict and post-conflict nations. The initiative was co-curated by teams from Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and the United States. Through this international collaboration, curators and photographers reflect upon each country’s transition from war to peace. This collection of photographs, texts and timelines do not intend to provide a comprehensive overview of any one nation or community, but instead, offers introductions and intimate glimpses into a selection of intersecting issues and themes across diverse regions. The information that follows digs deeper, to get behind the process of ‘Transitions’ via the personal and professional insights from interviews with Leslie Thomas, founder of ART WORKS Projects, Chicago and initiator of the project and Leslie Woodward, co-founder and vice president of the Post-Conflict Research Center (PCRC), Sarajevo. Together, they comprise one half of the international curatorial team behind ‘Transitions,’ working alongside Yole!Africa out of Goma, DRC and Centro Nacional de Memoria Histórica in Bogota, Colombia. Photographers Sophia Nahli Alison (US), Midhat Poturović (BiH), Martin Lukongo (DRC), and Juan Arredondo brought each team’s vision to life. ‘Transitions’ formally began with a huge amount of exploratory discussion before the taking or selecting of any images. Brainstorming potential themes was facilitated by team members’ prior knowledge (for instance, in BiH, PCRC’s founder and president, Velma Šarić, is an investigative journalist by training, with in-depth knowledge of transitional justice mechanisms in the Western Balkans) as well as extensive research and collaboration with area experts. In BiH, four distinct themes emerged from these brainstorming sessions: An argument could be made that deciding on themes may have been the easier step in the process; how to appropriately visually represent these themes – often couched in legally perplexing jargon – was the teams’ next challenge. For the Bosnian curatorial team, a portion of the photo series planning was built around getting coverage of established events and known dates. Whilst a solid first stepping stone, the team was keen to capture a more organic side of transitional justice; to look its day-to-day emotions and actions directly in the face. This photographic behavior predictably raised some suspicion around certain memorial sites, often protected within communities. So while justice itself can be played out concrete terms, the teams were always prepared to use creative methods to overcome this challenge of capturing exactly how each post-conflict society measures its development. Acquiring these creative methods was assuaged by the curators’ direction to the photographers: they were granted freedom to interpret the themes through their own lens. Accompanying the visual component was a required exegesis to disclose those facets not immediately communicated through the photographs’ formal elements, i.e. color, shape, line and composition. For ‘Transitions’, each team produced a timeline of related events that chronicled the breakdown and subsequent partial restorative journey back to normalcy. These timelines were designed as such to illustrate that the journey to justice is neither neat nor linear. For the US, the Civil War was a moment in the fight against slavery, yet this fight, albeit in an insidiously evolved form, is not over. In BiH, the timeline features major moves forward in the search for truth and justice, such as the international recognition of rape as a crime against humanity. Just as the line goes beyond the primary limits of a conflict to show a current, post-conflict situation, it also starts before the official beginning of a conflict. In BiH, the team went back as far as General Josip Broz Tito’s death in 1980 to give adequate historical space for a greater pre-conflict context.