Masked Nationalists Disrupt Art Exhibition in Greece, Claiming Artist Threatens Greek Identity

Masked nationalists claiming membership in the Greek neo-Nazi group Golden Dawn said last Thursday they disrupted an art exhibition near Thessaloniki in northern Greece by a painter from North Macedonia. In a video posted on YouTube, the Golden Dawn Youth Front claimed to have “forbidden” the exhibition of the artist Sergej Andreevski which was held in Kalamaria, a locality close to Thessaloniki.

The video shows several masked and hooded men going to the municipal gallery to confront Sergej Andreevski, whom they accuse of having published irredentist documents and of having “cast doubt on the Greek identity of our homeland”. “You have no right to be here”exclaims one of the men in the video. “We have parents and grandfathers who sacrificed their lives to make Macedonia Greek”he adds.

The mayor of Kalamaria, Ioannis Dardamanelis, questioned by the press, indicated that a group of ten people had disturbed the exhibition “the last day”. He called the protesters “irredentist hotheads” seeking publicity ahead of the general election scheduled for May 21.

As part of a bilateral agreement concluded in 2018 between Athens and Skopje, the neighboring country took the name of the Republic of North Macedonia, ending a long diplomatic dispute over the name of this Balkan country. Concluded then by the left-wing Greek Prime Minister at the time, Alexis Tsipras, and his Macedonian counterpart, Zoran Zaev, this agreement was strongly contested by conservatives and nationalists in both countries.

Mr. Andreevski is an artist “renowned” who had already been invited to exhibit his works in Greece in 2002 and 2004, said the mayor of Kalamaria, adding that the Greek Ministry of Foreign Affairs had also approved the exhibition. A local police source told AFP that law enforcement was called to the scene but protesters had already left the gallery when they arrived and no arrests had been made.

Golden Dawn is a xenophobic and neo-Nazi formation that gained popularity during the economic crisis in Greece (2009-2018). This party was discredited after the assassination of a Greek rapper in 2013 by one of its members also accused of violence against migrants and leftist sympathizers. In 2020, Golden Dawn leaders received long prison sentences for “constitution of a criminal organization”.