Enjeux Humains: human rights are far from universally accepted

The cartoon exhibition Human Issues (Enjeux Humains), in the art centre La cité Miroir in Liège, shows interesting works of some of the best international press cartoonists until 28 January 2024. They reflect the state of respect for global human rights today.

La Cité Miroir, a particular museum and art centre in the heart of Liège, was formerly a sports centre and swimming pool. In this particular setting, challenging expositions on social issues are held, such as the satirical cartoon exhibition Enjeux Humains, which brings satirical cartoons to the table to highlight the declaration of human rights.

Strange setting! The entrance to the exhibition imitates an access to the subway, and the exhibition is held in a former swimming pool that once had plenty of mermaids swimming in its blue, chlorine-filled waters. Now its dry bed supports human creativity.

The first thing visitors will see is a painting depicting the plight of Afghan girls drawn by Afghan artist Nahid Zamani. This drawing depicts the myriad paths a child has, but it also shows the only place Afghan girls can occupy.

Continue down the corridor and you will see caricatures that not only show gender inequality in the eastern world but also in the western world. There is the painting by the Belgian painter Vadot where a woman has to climb endless stairs in order to represent her worth, while the man has the ease of a society that lifts him up in the form of a lift representing the patriarchal world.

Visitors also saw paintings depicting economic inequalities. In a painting by Mexican painter Solis, we can see the dreaded richest 1% dividing the earth as if it were dehumanising both rich and poor, and in the faces of the people painted, envy invaded their faces as if it were a contagious disease.

Continuing with economic inequalities, one can appreciate the painting by the painter Egidcio Sherif Arafa in which social access to education is represented by a large bag of money that acts as a counterweight to a springboard of inequalities, where education has gone from being a right to being a business.

With education we return to the Middle East in a painting drawn by Emanuele del Rosso in which we see an Iranian girl watching hopscotch where she has to go through all the injustices of her society in order to be a being who can imagine a better world for all girls like them.

The exhibition continues with works that criticise climate change. An issue that worries many people these days, but one that many experts believe is not being acted upon due to economic expediency. One painting that catches the attention of visitors is a caricature drawn by the American Kal showing a man going from extreme heat to extreme cold.

The cherry on top of the paper are the caricatures of the free press. In many pictures we can see politicians with pinocchio noses or people religiously consuming fake news that dulls them to reality. One that stands out is the one by the Ukrainian cartoonist Vladimir Kazanevsky in which he depicts a tiny journalist interviewing someone important, but whose face is depicted as a revolver in the style of Clint Eastwood.

The exhibition captures the imagination of anyone who wants to cry and laugh at the same time, on a subject that is so important that it leaves no one untouched.