Palestinian artists find their voices stifled by the global stage
As the brush strokes of Palestinian artists aim to capture the nuances of their experiences, an unwarranted hand of censorship leaves their canvases fractured and narratives truncated. Modification, suppression, and exclusion of Palestinian creatives resonate as a poignant testament to the power dynamics at play, casting a shadow over the canvas of cultural diversity.
In the midst of media repressing the Palestinian solidarity, statements, and protests by distorting the resistance as violent, chaotic, and futile, I think it is productive to gain insight into Palestinian resistance through art: a language that through sharing stories, feelings, and identities humanises narratives, bridging the gap between ourselves and those who may appear distant or foreign.
Creating art, exercising agency with free will, and using one’s own voice is an act of liberation. This liberation bears the transformative power to instigate change. However, the canvas of Palestinian art and expression has long been marred by the brushstrokes of suppression and censorship throughout modern history. Censorship, a straitjacket on the freedom of speech, has relentlessly gripped the Palestinian oppression. The narrative landscape, painted with vivid strokes of cultures, traditions, history, and struggles through artistic forms, has been systematically stripped away from the Palestinians.
Ghassan Kanafani, a Palestinian teacher, author, and revolutionary, laid the foundation for what was later coined “resistance literature.” His work, Return to Haifa, sticks out to me for its deeply personal lens that demonstrates the emotional complexities faced by individuals and families during the events of the 1948 Nakba. Kanafani delves into themes of displacement, loss, and the transformative impact of war on identity, providing readers with a visceral understanding of the lasting scars left by the Nakba, illustrating a narrative of Palestinian oppression at the hands of Israel. The author was a spokesperson for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and advocated against the establishment of the State of Israel, and for this advocacy, 36-year-old Kanafani was assassinated by the Mossad along with his 17-year-old niece in Beirut on July 8, 1972. In an interview, Richard Carleton asks Kanafani why he does not advocate for peace talks with the Israeli leaders to “stop the death and the misery, the destruction and the pain” of Palestinians, Israelis, and Arabs, for living in what Kanafani refers to as “starvation, killed for twenty years, and forbidden to use even the name ‘Palestinians’” is “better… than dead though.” To these statements, the revolutionary replied, “You don’t mean exactly ‘peace talks.’ You mean capitulation. Surrendering… People usually fight for something. And they stop fighting for something…To us, to liberate our country, to have dignity, to have respect, to have our mere human rights is something as essential as life itself.” Here, Kanafani implies that peace talks with the newly established State of Israel in the previous British mandate Palestine would mean surrendering to subjugation. Kanafani had no military experience; however in Lebanon’s The Daily Star newspaper obituary, he was regarded as a “commando who never fired a gun, whose weapon was a ballpoint pen, and his arena, newspaper pages.”
Another artist, Mohammad Abu Sakha, a 26-year-old Palestinian circus performer, was released on August 31, 2017, after nearly two years in an Israeli prison without charge or trial. He was arrested in December 2015 while crossing the Zaatara military checkpoint on his way to work at the Palestinian Circus School in Birzeit, near Ramallah and was held under a series of administrative detentions, regularly renewed. The military court ordered his administrative detention for six months, accusing him of “illegal activities” with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, but provided no evidence for the allegation. Amnesty International claims the Israeli authorities have “kept much of the ‘evidence’ they purport to hold against him secret, making it impossible for him to build an effective case to defend himself or challenge his detention.”
A ten-year-old cartoon character, Handala is distinctively marked by his perpetual backwards-facing stance, symbolising the way the world turned its back on the Palestinians in 1948. Purposefully depicted as a shabby, unkempt Palestinian child, Handala represents its creator, Naji Ali, and other Palestinian children who were expelled from their homes to pave the way for the establishment of the State of Israel. The choice of the name Handala originates from the Arabic word “Handhal,” referring to a bitter-tasting plant native to Palestine, symbolising the embittered experience of children like Handala, expelled from their homes. Handala’s lasting impact as a personification of Palestinians underscores the resilience of artistic expression even in the face of censorship, serving as a testament to the enduring power of art to convey suppressed stories.
In 1987, Naji Ali was tragically shot outside his London office. Renowned for creating the character of Handala, Ali worked for the Kuwaiti newspaper, Al Qabus, at the time. The identity of his killers remains shrouded in mystery to this day. Handala, the fictional creation, mirrors the painful reality of Naji Ali’s own past—as he, too, was forced to flee his village in the 1948 Nakba at the age of ten. Ali once said of Handala: “He was the age I was when I had left Palestine and, in a sense, I am still that age today, and I feel that I can recall and sense every bush, every stone, every house and every tree I passed when I was a child in Palestine.”
I want to remind the readers that artworks are not created in a vacuum; each stroke of the artist’s brush, every chosen word, and the melody of resistance in Palestinian art echo people’s yearning to reclaim their narrative, to transcend the confines of oppression and censorship.
Palestinian Death: Too Controversial for the ROM?
In the wake of the delayed opening of the Royal Ontario Museum’s (ROM) exhibition “Death: Life’s Greatest Mystery” in late October 2023, a series of events revealed an unsettling clash between artistic expression and institutional censorship. The turmoil began when Palestinian American artists, Jenin Yaseen and Sameerah Hosam Ahmed, along with other collaborators faced a Zoom call with ROM officials, who presented a document calling for the removal of specific words due to “heightened sensitivities” surrounding the Israel-Palestine conflict. This led to modifications in their exhibition, prompting an ultimatum for the artists to either accept the changes or withdraw entirely. However, in a bold act of resistance, Yaseen initiated an 18-hour protest sit-in inside the exhibition space with another unnamed Palestinian contributor. The ROM eventually reopened the exhibition after negotiations, displaying Yaseen’s original painting with a disclaimer. As the museum issued an apology for the “pain and frustration” caused, I examined how modifications distort the original stories, impacting the activism inherent in their art. In essence, I aim to shed light on the broader issue of artistic autonomy and cultural representation within the context of the ROM’s exhibition.
The exhibition, curated by Chen Shen at the ROM, was previously installed and developed at Chicago’s Field Museum. At the ROM, the exhibition calls for the guests to contemplate the abstruseness of death, a universal experience shared by life. Artworks highlight death through biological, artistic, and cultural contexts, showcasing diverse cultural practices and rituals and thus encourage guests to reflect on grief, remembrance, and survival.
The ROM, citing “heightened sensitivities around the Israel-Hamas conflict,” proposed modifications, including replacing “Palestine” with “West Bank” and softening the language. The substitution of Palestine with the West Bank alone implies ROM’s insensitivity and disregard for the tragic loss of civilian lives and the destruction of civilian infrastructure in Gaza. This change seems to distance Gaza from its rightful place within Palestine, undermining Gazans from the broader Palestinian experience.
The alterations went beyond linguistic and mere aesthetic changes, with significant misattributions and replacements, prompting a protest sit-in.
Hosam Ahmed’s quote, reflecting her family’s Muslim green burial practices and the nurturing care extended to graves and plants, was inaccurately divided and attributed to another contributor by the ROM. This misattribution disrupted the accurate portrayal of Ahmed’s perspective, as the first part of her quote was incorrectly presented as the museum’s voice, and the second part was wrongly attributed to another Palestinian contributor, Susan Jenin Yaseen. The misattribution of Ahmed’s perspective as the museum’s voice reflects a troubling infringement on artistic autonomy and cultural representation. This distortion not only undermines the authenticity of the artist’s voice but also raises concerns about institutions assuming authority over narratives, diluting the inherent activism in the artists’ work.
More prominently, Yaseen’s artwork underwent a profound transformation at the hands of the ROM. On October 27, the painting titled Indeed, to our love, we will return, featured in the Muslim Green Burial display, was entirely replaced with another painting. The replacement, bearing the same title and labelled (reproduced), featured a quote not crafted by the artist. This drastic substitution ensued after the artist refused to censor minor motifs within the extensive display painting.
The original artwork depicted a lifeless body adorned with flowers, aligning with Ahmed’s earlier quote on Muslim burial practices. Within this intricate depiction, a small section highlighted a poignant motif—an image of a deceased individual cradled by two soldiers. According to Yaseen, this motif starkly reflected the harsh reality faced by Palestinian families, denied the right to observe green burial practices due to bodies being held in the “occupation’s freezers and the cemeteries of numbers.” Intended to portray the violation of Palestinian bodies held hostage by Israeli soldiers, Yaseen’s painting fell victim to cropping, deliberate painting over of sections, thus distorting the impactful narrative it initially conveyed. In response, the artist protested during the sit-in, providing a large canvas by a Jewish ally to magnify the original motif in the small section of the painting, making it “clear that [she is] NOT censoring the reality of the Palestinian struggle.”
By cropping and deliberately painting over sections of the painting, external forces undermine the artist’s intended message, violating the core principle of artistic autonomy. The cultural representation, depicting the struggles of Palestinian families in the context of green burial practices, is compromised as elements crucial to conveying this narrative are removed and altered. Yaseen’s artwork was not merely a creative expression; it served as a form of activism, shedding light on social and political issues. I interpret the alteration as an attempt to sanitise and control the narrative, thereby diminishing the struggles of Palestinians.
The ROM’s modifications, including linguistic changes, misattributions, and the replacement of artwork, reflect an attempt to control the narrative around the Israel-Palestine conflict. By altering the language and content of the exhibition, the ROM sought to manage the sensitivities associated with the conflict and possibly to avoid controversy or backlash. In doing so, however, the institution silenced the authentic voices of the Palestinian artists and compromised the activism embedded in their art. The act of censorship, in this context, seems more about maintaining a curated narrative than fostering genuine artistic expression and representation.
Art serves as a mirror reflecting the socio-political landscape, allowing communities to showcase their histories, grievances, and dreams. In the case of the ROM’s exhibition, the attempt to sanitise and control the narrative underscores a broader issue—how institutions wield authority in shaping the discourse around contentious subjects. The narratives embedded in the artists’ work are not mere brushstrokes; they are expressions of a lived reality, a cultural heritage, and a form of resistance against forces that seek to distort or silence them.
The suppression not only stifles individual artistic expressions but also becomes a broader reflection of the challenges faced by marginalised voices in asserting their cultural identity. Altering or removing elements from the artworks is akin to erasing chapters from the collective story of a community—in this case, the Palestinian people.
Its impact extends beyond the confines of the museum walls, reaching into the international sphere where perceptions of a culture are shaped. The ROM’s actions to ‘soften’ the struggles depicted by the Palestinian artists contribute to a narrative that may inadvertently perpetuate stereotypes or misconceptions about the Palestinian experience. This echoes a wider concern about the responsibility of cultural institutions to present diverse and authentic narratives, free from undue influence or censorship.
The power dynamics evident in the censorship highlight a need for a reevaluation of the relationship between institutions and the artists they aim to showcase. Museums and galleries, as custodians of cultural representation, should act as platforms for fostering dialogue, understanding, and appreciation for the richness of human experiences. When censorship seeps into these spaces, it not only infringes upon the autonomy of artists but also diminishes the potential for cross-cultural understanding and empathy.
