In witnessing events of political consequence art continues to bear its share as demonstrated in the abundant literature on trauma that is mostly associated with projects of healing. There is also a more recent scholarship that is broader in scope and that focuses on the politics of witnessing and especially on the critical power and moral authority of artists and spectators as witnesses. This paper contributes to the latter by reexamining the privileged position of the artist, the locations of her moral authority and power, the aesthetic regime employed, and the new technologies that enhance and reproduce art as witness through an examination of select visual artworks on human rights violations and abuses of dignity.
