The Gallery as Public Square: ‘Almost Dawn in Libya’

The 'Almost Dawn in Libya' project aims to show Libyans photographs taken during the civil war in their country and, in doing so, foster peace.

The photographer André Liohn, who got an early start on covering the civil war in Libya and stayed in the country through the killing of Muammar Gaddafi, was recently asked not to use that term—civil war—to describe the conflict. Liohn had returned to Libya to introduce a project that he started with seven other photographers who covered the war-torn African nation last year. They call the project Almost Dawn in Libya, and through it they plan to exhibit their photographs of the war in the Libyan cities of Tripoli, Misurata, Benghazi and Zintan. But as LiohnBerlin– A year after a German court issued a ruling that would have dramatically restricted U.S. drone operations in accordance with international law, no substantive changes have taken place, as the lawsuit that led to the March 2019 ruling is still stuck in the appeals process.

The lawsuit, filed by Yemeni engineer Faisal bin Ali Jaber over the killing of two family members, alleges that the German government intentionally ignored U.S. forces’ use of Ramstein Air Base, near Mannheim, as a vital data transfer point in drone assassinations. Those drone operations often kill civilians in areas where the United States has not declared war — a category of attack that has been interpreted as being against international law.

According to the human rights organization Reprieve, which also took part in