Thursday, October 18, 2007
It would be a bad "business decision" to publish an art book with the word "Zionism" in the title in San Francisco: Painter Presses His Cause on Canvas
The artist, Alan Kaufman, said several of his Jewish-themed paintings were rotated on-and-off the walls at the Himmelberger Gallery near Union Square beginning in July. Some of Mr. Kaufman's works bear the names of figures from the Hebrew Bible, while others listed in a contract with the gallery have titles such as "Anti-Semitism," "Battle for Israel," and "Flight of Israel's Foes." One canvas is named after an Israeli city near the Gaza Strip, Sderot, and depicts a figure crouched under a Jewish star as missiles fly overhead.
Mr. Kaufman said he and the gallery's owner, David Himmelberger, were working closely on a catalog of the art as well as plans to exhibit it at other sites, when Mr. Himmelberger expressed discomfort with using the word "Zionist" in the catalog's title and with essays that included references to Zionism.
An attorney for Mr. Himmelberger, Edward Sarti, described the gallery's choice not to go forward with the catalog as "a business decision."
Mr. Kaufman said the disagreement erupted on October 8 at a meeting with Mr. Himmelberger to discuss the layout and contents of the 24-page catalog. "He had a printout of the catalog with ‘Visionary Expressionism: A Zionist Art' in front of him. He pointed to the word, ‘Zionism,' and said, ‘I can't do that," Mr. Kaufman told The New York Sun. "I said, ‘What exactly is the problem? You know what my paintings are about.'"
"He said, ‘I don't stand for that. … We don't want to advocate any kind of platform here,'" Mr. Kaufman said. The artist said it was not the content of his art, but the labeling of it as Zionist that seemed to be the sticking point. "None of the paintings at the gallery have the actual word ‘Zionism' in it. I think it was the appearance of the actual word Zionism in the title and all the essays that shocked him. He gave me the impression that, ‘Oh my God, we have a Zionist in the house.'"...
Via Robert J. Avrech who writes:
Yeah, about as brave as wearing the latest Dolce & Gabbana threads.
But G-d forbid you should even mention a particular word...
[h/t: Jeremiah.]
Wow! They can't even mention "Zionism," anymore. It's come to this!
Zionism has been so maligned by anti-Zionists, with notions of racism and apartheid attached to it by anti-Zionists, that the word itself has become taboo, except when placed on a placard with a Nazi symbol next to it.
Kudos to the artist for being so courageous.
What: Palestinian Cultural Mural Inauguration
Honoring Dr. Edward Said: A Day-Long Celebration
When: Friday, November 2, 2007 (see complete schedule below)
Where: All Events at San Francisco State University,
1600 Holloway Street, San Francisco
The General Union of Palestine Students at San Francisco State University
announces the inauguration of the Palestinian Cultural Mural. This artwork,
honoring the late Palestinian scholar and intellectual Edward Said
(1935-2003), is the first of its kind on any American university campus. The
Palestinian Cultural Mural began as a historic idea to celebrate and
represent Palestinian culture, identity and thought in an academic setting,
and to commemorate the academic and intellectual work of Edward Said, his
life, and his unremitting pursuit of social justice. Author of the
groundbreaking book Orientalism and many other books, articles, and essays,
as well as professor of comparative literature at Columbia University, Said
was a literary theorist and activist who illuminated the lives and struggles
of Palestinians under occupation and broadened the international discourse
about oppression, social justice, and self-representation .
Spearheaded by the Palestinian students of San Francisco State University,
mural supporters fought a sustained battle to gain University approval for
the mural, and its final completion is an occasion for celebration. The lead
artists for the mural, Dr. Fayeq Oweis and Dr.Susan Greene, worked for over
two years to create a design featuring over 20 visual elements symbolizing
the work and words of Edward Said, the Palestinian struggle for peace and
justice, Arab culture, and student activism. To view an image of the mural
or learn more about the muralists visit www.sfgups.org
.
The General Union of Palestine Students, along with the SFSU Cesar Chavez
Student Center Governing Board, and co-sponsors the Middle East Children's
Alliance, The Arab Cultural and Community Center, The Arab Resource and
Organizing Center (AROC), ZAWAYA, The Richard Oaks Multicultural Center at
SFSU, the Arab and Muslim Ethnicities and Diasporas Initiative (AMED),
Sunbula: Arab Feminists for Change, and the Break the Silence Mural Project
will host a full day of events and cultural presentations to mark the
inauguration of the historic Palestinian Cultural Mural.
Schedule of Events:
10:30-11:30 am: Community Breakfast
Jack Adams Hall, SFSU
. Music by Georges Lammam
12-2 pm: Palestinian Cultural Mural Inaugural Ceremony
Cesar Chavez Student Center, SFSU
. Addresses by Dr. Sonia Nimr, Professor of History, Birzeit
University, Palestine, and Dr. Hatem Bazian, Professor, UC-Berkeley
. Native American Dance by Mission Creek
. Palestinian folk dance by Al-Juthoor
. Arab-American Hip Hop by The Nomads, The Philistines, and Excentrik
. Mural Blessing by Anne Marie Seyers,
2-5 pm: Reception and Lunch
Jack Adams Hall, SFSU
featuring classical and contemporary music by the Georges Lammam Ensemble
7-10 pm: Evening Performance (Social Hour, 6-7 pm, admission $10 students,
$20 general)
Knuth Hall, Creative Arts Building
. Poetry and Spoken Word by Deema Shehabi, Fady Joudah, Zaid Shlah,
and Elmaz Abinader
. Music by Tony Khalife and Kamal Ghammache-Mansour, Timothy Kelly,
and Omar Khorsheed.
. Palestinian folk dance by Al-Juthoor
"Palestinian Cultural Mural Inauguration
Honoring Dr. Edward Said..."
Hmmmmm...I'll make a wild guess and say they won't be featuring paintings by Alan Kaufman.
An interesting point: You'll note that there will be a Native American dance performed at this shindig. The Palestinians are really pounding on a new riff in their propaganda: that they're the equivalent of Native Americans. Remember the Arab guys decked out in Native American paint and headdresses? I think there were pictures of that right on this site a few months back. Or somewhere.
STATEMENT
Zionism is the Civil Rights Movement of the Jewish People. It is the answered prayer to two thousand years of ceaseless persecution at the hands of unpredictable host nations and of religions that at times abandoned their own highest moral precepts in the pursuit of dubious political objectives at the expense of Jewish life and limb.
For an individual or institution to claim to respect and tolerate Jews and yet deny a Jew, any Jew, the right to proclaim Zionism as a personal spiritual, cutural and political raison d'etre, is like telling a Black person that you regard him as your equal and friend but please, do not mention the March on Birmingham; please, don’t talk about Martin Luther King; please, don’t bring up Rosa Parks to me.
Zionism is the March on Birmingham, the Martin Luther King, the Rosa Parks of our people, the Jewish People. It is our march on the death camp at Auschwitz; it is our fight for an equal place on the bus of human history.
And the State of Israel is our Promised Land of freedom and equality on earth.
How the term Zionism, and all that it so powerfully represents to our people after the Holocaust; how this term Zionism, this vision of redemption, this philosophy of empowerment, this bright candle held up to the night and which lead back home the displaced and tortured remnants, the dreamers and idealists, the Jews who came from all corners of the earth with a vision of self-determination and cultural, spiritual and political renewal; how this miracle of an idea was brought to fruition through the sacrifice and struggle of the brave Israeli people, is one of the great miracles of human history.
And how this same Zionism, distorted and vilified by one of the most sordid disinformation campaigns in history, became the bete noire of the present day, a refugee of a word, a pariah of an idea, is one of the most sordid instances in the long, cruel campaign to marginalize and, ultimately, to destroy the Jewish People.
Let us, then, be perfectly frank about one thing. To vilify, marginalize, suppress or outlaw Zionism politically, socially or culturally, for any reason whatever, is to wish no less then murderous extinction upon every Jewish man, woman and child in the world today. It is to refute our history entire, to deny us the memory of our long march out of bondage into equality and dignity. It is to assert ghettoization and ostracization, exile and massacre as the only fate befitting a Jew.
If ignorance of the law does not exempt one from the law, then equally, ignorance, pretended or real, of the unthinkable consequences to Jews of a world without Israel does not exempt one from the certain knowledge that no less then genocide awaits our people should the campaign against Zionism succeed.
We affirm our right --moral, spiritual, cultural and political -- to proclaim our Zionism in any manner that we choose, without hinderence or proscription, and further, we condemn, forcefully and completely the stance of anti-Zionism for what so blatently it is: a human rights violation and euphemistic mask behind which lurks the age-old nightmare of anti-Semitism.
Signed,
Alan Kaufman
The Zionist Five