Palestinian artist Yazan Khalili received an unpleasant message before the opening of his exhibition in Germany. Burglars emptied a fire extinguisher and chalked death threats on the wall.
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Documenta 15, a prestigious five-yearly art festival, which will be on display in Kassel for three months from Saturday 18 June, has been struggling with protests since January, which are getting more intense as the opening approaches.
It started in January with a complaint from the Kassel Alliance Against Anti-Semitism against the Question of Funding Collective, of which Khalili is a part. This group, which participates in the Documenta, has been accused of anti-Semitism, if only because the group’s original name referred to the Arab nationalist Khalil al-Sakakini (1878–53). Al-Sakakini was not only a pan-Arab, but also had Nazi sympathies and saw Zionism as a major threat.
That the organization had invited the collective that once bore the name of this nationalist was seen as an affront, because it gave room to anti-Semitism. “There is a lot of emotion and fear,” Khalili tells the channel Al Jazeera† “Since January, there have been more and more aggressive media campaigns against me and other Palestinian artists, or artists who have expressed support for Palestine.”
Support for Palestine
This edition of the Documenta is curated by the Indonesian art collective ruangrupa, and never before have so many artists from the global South been seen in one edition. What started with obscure blog posts was picked up more and more. The media called for the cancellation of this edition. Support for Palestine is still relatively sensitive in Germany, where demonstrations were still banned in May to commemorate the Palestinian victims of 1948.
There are often protests at the committed Documenta, an exhibition that was set up in the 1950s precisely to bring the world into dialogue through art, but protests and threats like this have never been seen before.
Last Friday, a large group of participating artists expressed their support for ruangrupa and thus for the Palestinian collective. In that statement, the artists also distance themselves from anti-Semitism. “We condemn the racist attacks that underlie this, and we are strongly against all forms of discrimination.” The organization itself has now indicated that it will open as usual, but this time with a little more security.
information-text">The Documenta art festival in Kassel starts on Saturday 18 June.
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