Sergio Vieira De Mello

Sergio Vieira De Mello was the Secretary-General’s Special Representative in Iraq who was killed in a car bomb explosion at the Canal Hotel in ...

Sergio Vieira De Mello was the Secretary-General’s Special Representative in Iraq who was killed in a car bomb explosion at the Canal Hotel in 2003 in Baghdad along with 20 members of the UN mission. His long career in diplomacy and his tragic loss provoked the New Catalogue Studio to think about how we could make a memorial for a peacemaker. We decided to create a series of graphic totems that detailed his life, career, birth and death. Instead of making a static work that simply looked at the past we merged his life with a corporate sponsorship of a fictional motorcycle rally from Paris to Darfur. In essence we gave Sergio one last mission, to help mediate the intractable problems of Darfur. “Oh Shit” is one of the decals that adorns the Enduro Bike and is centrally located on the large decal sheet. According to some accounts he uttered these words when the bomb went off outside the Canal Hotel and the building started to collapse. It has become the working title of the project, not only referencing one man’s last words, but also a comment to the darker aspects of the human condition.