Maung Day, Assassination on the Kitchen Floor

In April 2022 – almost a year after a series of wars broke out between the Arakan Army and the Bamar Military in the area, Burmese artist Maung Day took a trip to Arakan Land. On this trip through Sittwe, Mrauk-U and other small Arakanese towns, he brought along a drawing book, into which he sketched out the sights of his journey. Upon returning home, he redrew many of these sketches.

Of this drawing, Maung Day writes:
"Assassinations take place throughout Myanmar on a daily basis these days. When I was in Sittwe, I heard the news of a pro-junta village administrator murdered on his kitchen floor, with many people assuming it was the handiwork of some revolutionary or revolutionaries. I also saw the picture of the murder scene being circulated online. The grotesque photograph showed a man in his 50s dead on the floor biting his own tongue, making it look like he was trying to swallow something round. In fact, the tongue rolled up in his mouth, and the rolled-up tip of the tongue stuck out. The news said he was not just an ordinary village administrator and he was working as an informant for the Bamar Army, giving out the names of the locals who spoke against the dictator Min Aung Hlaing. Some people were arrested because of that, and he meanwhile became the target of the revolutionaries who are trying to wipe out pro-junta spies. Having spies or informants in the neighborhoods has made the locals feel anxious and unsafe, creating an atmosphere toxic and full of mistrust."