Avoiding jail, connecting Palestine and blazing trails for national resistance art
▶ Pioneers reveal how creativity on the front line preserves history, writes
Between the Nakba and the First Intifada, Palestinian art revolved around symbols that were representative of the nation’s culture and identity. The olive trees, pigeons and textile motifs were instrumental in opposing the Zionist slogan that Palestine was “a land without a people for a people without a land”.
Art has long been a vital front line in the act of political resistance. It has helped maintain and hone the collective Palestinian spirit and has been pivotal in subverting opposing rhetoric. As the conflict has oscillated across the decades, rearing an ever-uglier head with each iteration, artists have sought to reflect on the social and political realities on the ground, often experimenting with new mediums.
From as early as the mid-20th century, Palestinian art has shown the culture that was at stake with the formation of Israel. It was evidence that Palestine was not a country barren of identity; instead, it was home to people indigenous to the land.
Identity, by its very nature, is an abstract concept that is hard to capture and depict. From around the time of the 1948 Nakba until the First Intifada began in 1987, Palestinian artists often expressed national solidarity with visual symbols they knew would be popular, including embroidery and natural landscapes.
“We also took a few things from Islamic art, Arabic calligraphy, as well as Canaanite sources,” Palestinian artist Sliman Mansour said at Sharjah’s recent March Meeting.
“All those sources we used them as symbols to tell people about the Palestinian identity.”
The artworks elucidated the fact that Palestine was a thriving nation before 1948, when Zionist militants launched a brutal and systematic onslaught that destroyed 500 Palestinian towns and villages and forcibly displaced more than 700,000 people.
“The reaction of artists and intellectuals was to prove that we are here and we have our own personality, our own identity and destiny,” artist Tayseer Barakat also said during the discussion.
He and Mansour were joined by their peers Vera Tamari and Nabil Anani on the panel. The quartet have been at the forefront of the Palestinian arts scene since the 1970s and their conversation provided insight into how it has been a necessary tool in political resistance.
The discussion was especially pertinent in today’s context. As the war in Gaza passes the 150day mark, more than 30,500 have been killed.
Mansour and Anani were the co-founders of the League of Palestinian Artists, which was established in the early 1970s with the aim of connecting artists from the country and its diaspora. Barakat and Tamari, meanwhile, were among its members who helped develop the collective’s mission of how art could be used as a tool to raise political awareness and resistance.
“There were many professional artists. But as an active movement, it was very modest,” Anani said of Palestine’s artistic scene after the Nakba.
While there were milestones for Palestinian expressions, including major exhibitions in the 1960s throughout the region, it wasn’t until the establishment of the League of Palestinian Artists that a unified artistic effort was shaped.
“We were about 15 to 20 artists from the West Bank and Gaza, we started by organising activities and exhibitions,” Anani says. “We started in Jerusalem, then spread to other areas like Nablus, Jenin and Ramallah. We organised those exhibitions annually. They gave popularity to the arts because people were hungry to see something about Palestine.
“This movement of art was popular because there was that connection between people and the artists, people would come, ask questions and discuss artistic works. They were symbolic. They had nationalist aspects, political aspects.
“We would also have tents for people who just got out of the refugee camps or jails. We would have Palestinian flags.”
These efforts did not go unnoticed by the Israeli government. Those involved in the exhibitions, including Anani and Mansour, were held for interrogation. “They did not want those direct symbols, which they considered against Israel,” Anani says. “They closed down many exhibitions. After we founded Gallery 97, they also shut it down many times. They would put a red seal and did not allow us to open for months. When we could open, they’d just shut us down again. They confiscated paintings and they put some artists in jail.”
However, these measures did not deter Anani and his peers. If anything, it only strengthened their resolve and with the political developments in Palestine, the artists sought to revise and develop their methodologies and concepts.
All four were among those who shaped the core of Palestinian resistance art after the First Intifada when they formed New Visions in 1988. As riots erupted across Palestine, the artists realised that a new form of art had to materialise. The New Visions movement was dedicated to producing art that contributed to national struggles while staying true to the styles of its individual artists.
“The intifada led to some sort of deep thinking for us in between the four of us,” Barakat said. “We started working towards something different from before. This allowed us to convey our voice to the rest of the world.”
For many Palestinian artists, it may be too soon to offer any artistic reflection to the chaos. But the conversation between some of the country’s trailblazing figures of resistance art served as a potent reminder of how art is an indispensable tool for the struggle.
“We are seeing a real threat to the existence of Palestinian people, not just their art,” Tamari, who appeared virtually on the panel, said.
“This country will go on and we have to be proud.”
When we could open, they’d just shut us down again. They confiscated paintings and they put some artists in jail
NABIL ANANI
Artist