Everything will stay the same if we don’t speak up

We, members of L’Internationale, speak as the genocide of Palestinians is being broadcast to the world while those speaking out against it are being silenced.

We speak as the cultural field is threatened anew by the censorship, self-censorship, pre-censorship, language policing, cancellation, disinvitation and defunding of politically dissenting voices.
We speak as the cultural field has turned into a battleground.

We see the imperative to overcome our collective failure to find a common voice.
We see the imperative to speak together, which is not always allowed, encouraged or trusted.

We speak with friends and allies whose strength and words empower us.

To the artists, poets and writers who refuse complicity in silence, who understand that silence is a position.

To the cultural workers who reclaim their right to have their own voice and to not echo the position of the institution and the state.

We see censorship and the criminalization of political dissent
returning to so-called liberal democracies.
We see artists and activists being arrested in the streets.
We see cancelled programmes everywhere.
We see artists and cultural workers being disinvited.
We see artists and activists being shadow banned.
We see websites being shut down.
We see contracts not being renewed.
We see artists and cultural workers being defunded.

To the artists and activists who are cancelled for calling for a ceasefire, for an end to the dehumanization of Palestinians.

To the artists who are withdrawing in protest at institutional censorship.

We see that the ground for silencing was being prepared long before the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
We see the excess of information as having created the conditions for silence and inaction.
We see the impossibility of art during genocide.
We see the necessity of art during genocide.
We see our relationships fracturing.

To the directors of cultural institutions who are forced to resign because of unfounded accusations of anti-Semitism.

To the Jewish directors of cultural institutions who are forced to resign because of unfounded accusations of anti-Semitism.

We see artists and cultural workers double guessing what boards might think.
We see endless open letters.
We see people too scared to sign open letters.
We see lists appearing with ‘the good ones’ and ‘the bad ones’.
We see students asking unanswered questions.
We see Palestinian flags being taken down from universities.

To the students who are blocked from organizing a Palestinian solidarity reading group on procedural grounds.

To the educators whose contract is not renewed because they support students protesting genocide.

We see scholars, journalists, artists and poets silenced through escalating disciplinary measures.
We see Palestinian scholars, journalists, artists and poets slaughtered in Gaza and beyond.
We see Palestinian life and expression in danger all over the world.
We see writers resigning from their positions in major media outlets, refusing complicity,
leaving holes the size of poetry.
Holes in the land of Palestinians.
Holes in the hearts of Palestinians.
People too thirsty to be able to cry.

To the cultural workers who are too scared to be recorded speaking publicly for fear of reprisal.

To the academics who are told not to teach, to keep quiet and stay at home until their contract expires.

We see a blatant disregard for international law.
We see the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism limiting the ability to combat fascism.
We see that Palestine shines a light on colonialism across the world.
We see how it is deemed acceptable to not address apartheid after 76 years of occupation.
We see that after the ICJ and UN resolutions, the world, including the art worlds, must not keep silent.
We see Palestine looking.
We feel Palestine listening.

To the Jewish cultural workers who are accused of anti-Semitism based on the IHRA definition.

To the artists who refuse to sign a document stating their adherence to the IHRA definition of anti-Semitism.

We see all the art centres, all the universities, and hundreds of schools destroyed in Gaza.
We see museums and archives going to crumbs, memories becoming dust.
We see children buried under the dust.
We see children still dancing in the dust.
We see more clearly, despite all the dust.
We see too much from above.
We see eyes under the rubble.
We see that we are privileged to see.
We want to stop only seeing.
We are done with seeing.

To the cultural workers who are told to qualify their respect for all human life, as if this should not apply to Palestinians as well as Israelis.

To the art and cultural institutions opting to end funding from companies and organizations that serves to culture wash apartheid and genocide.

We see money determining our political imagination.
We see imagination starved.
We see people starving.
We see that art is dying where life dies too.
We see preventive censorship as a new master’s tool.
We hear ‘hush-hush, use your words appropriately’.
We see European cultural institutions being used to normalize genocide.
We see inexplicable motives to conceal what is happening.
We see all this happening in the open.
Do you see what we see?
Is only seeing enough?
What are we waiting to see next?
A disclaimer cannot protect us anymore.

To the cultural workers who no longer receive institutional invitations because they signed an open letter naming and condemning genocide.

To the cultural workers who want to speak out against genocide but do not know how to because their institutions have fostered a culture of silence.

We see too many cultural institutions not knowing what to say,
saying anything at all while saying nothing.
Are we saying something?
We see too many cultural institutions doing nothing,
afraid of the consequences.
Are we doing something?
We see art institutions fighting among themselves.
We see the cultural sector faltering.

To the artists who have their year-long project cancelled by the university that employed them, who are told to keep the money but stay silent.

To the lawyers and academics doing pro bono work to expose censorship.

We see business as usual.
We see colleagues keeping quiet for fear of losing funding.
We see colleagues afraid of losing their jobs and livelihoods.
We see cultural institutions still accepting funds tied to Israel.
We see double standards prevailing at art biennials.
We see our complicity when we participate in events financed by the same capital
and supported by the same countries that send arms to Israel.
We see public institutions who are unwilling – or unable – to take a position against genocide.
We see only a few brave public institutions taking a position against genocide.
We see powerful artists’ networks taking a position against genocide.

We see that everything will stay the same if we don’t speak up.

17 April 2024

Image from homepage: lumbung press installation. Exhibition view of Song for Many Movements: Scenes of Collective Creation, MACBA. Photo: Miquel Coll, 2024. ©️ MACBA