16/4/24: NO BUSINESS AS USUAL DURING A GENOCIDE
ANGA's campaign has ensured there can be no business as usual at the Venice Biennale while Israel commits genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. The artistic team of the Israeli Pavilion has retreated as a direct consequence of widespread pressure and our collective campaign.
The Genocide Pavilion has been forced to respond to 24,000 signatories who condemn the Israeli genocide against Palestinians in Gaza but, contrary to the artistic team’s claims, they have not withdrawn, the pavilion has not been closed.
ANGA reiterates its demand to shut down the pavilion in its entirety.
ANGA does not applaud empty and opportunistic gestures timed for maximum press coverage, and leaving video works on view to the public, while Palestinians are killed by Israel every hour and millions face imminent famine.
ANGA calls for an end to the genocide being perpetrated by Israel against Palestinians in Gaza, an end to the apartheid and an end to the occupation of Palestine.
ANGA calls for all cultural workers of conscience to join us in these explicit demands. We refuse anything less.
Any official representation of the state of Israel on the international cultural stage is an endorsement of its policies and of the genocide in Gaza.
NO WINDOW DISPLAY.
ANGA calls for the exclusion of Israel from the Venice Biennale.
Shut it down.
No death in Venice.
No business as usual.
18/3/24: ANGA ESCALATION: BOYCOTT THE GENOCIDE PAVILION
NO VISITORS, NO PRESS, NO PARTIES
30 days and counting until Israel's Genocide Pavilion opens at the Venice Biennale.
As Israel's artist and curatorial team press ahead with their "Fertility Pavilion" due to open on 17 April, ANGA escalates its campaign. We call for a boycott of the pavilion of Israel, which represents an apartheid state perpetrating genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.
The Biennale has refused our principled call, supported by 22,000+ arts workers, for the exclusion of Israel while it is on trial at the United Nations International Court of Justice for "plausible genocide" against Palestinians in Gaza.
The Italian Culture Minister says culture is "a bridge between people and nations, not a dividing wall." Culture is not a bridge between people and nations when one nation is involved in the elimination of another, the citizens of which are kept behind a literal prison wall. The Minister says Israel has "a duty to bear witness to its people" at the Biennale. We bear witness to the more than 31,341 Palestinians killed in Gaza by the Israeli occupation, including over 13,000 children, and the many thousands wounded, maimed, and orphaned. We bear witness to the 2.2 million Palestinians internally displaced and starving to death in a famine deliberately imposed by Israel. We bear witness to Israel's mass destruction of Palestinian art and culture. We bear witness to 75 years of Israel's occupation of Palestine.
The Venice Biennale will not consider any petition or request to exclude the presence of Israel from this year's 60th International Art Exhibition, in disregard of its own history of excluding South Africa due to its globally condemned apartheid regime. The Biennale also ignores its own impassioned public statements in support of Ukraine following Russia's illegal military invasion in 2022.
ANGA refuses empty rhetoric and rejects any exceptionalism for the genocidal apartheid state of Israel currently on trial at the highest court in the world.
We call for a boycott of the Israeli Pavilion. No visitors, no press coverage, no parties. We call for the refusal to accept the presence at any events of official delegations, institutions or persons tied in any capacity to the Israeli government. We call for arts workers to withdraw from any events associated with the state of Israel. We call for the pavilions of other nations in the Giardini and beyond to exclude Israel from their own events. We invite artists participating in the Biennale to make known their recognition of the genocide against Palestinians in Gaza and their support for ANGA's campaign.
Join ANGA. Make yourself visible. Raise your voice.
No death in Venice.
No business as usual.
BOYCOTT THE GENOCIDE PAVILION AT THE VENICE BIENNALE.