AN exhibition in the Marino Church in Bantry aims to show the work of Palestinian artists and express awareness of their plight.
The exhibition opened last Friday and continues until December 13th.
Organised by the Palestine Museum US, in partnership with the Bantry group for Palestine and supported by the Cork Palestine Solidarity Campaign, some pieces in this exhibition have recently been shown in Venice and London.
The show tries to underscore how conflict has reshaped Palestinian culture over the course of decades. For Palestinian artists showing their art is extremely important, says Faisal Saleh, the Palestine Museum US founder and the curator of the Bantry exhibition.
An image by Khalil Khalidy which features at the exhibition in Bantry. Khalil is a doctor and artist who had the chance to escape Gaza, but chose to remain, treating the sick and wounded.
‘Most artists in Gaza lost all their artwork - destroyed by bombing,’ Saleh said. ‘The Palestinian art and cultural institutions in Gaza, are all destroyed: museums, libraries, every university, bookshop… anything that has to do with culture and art in Gaza, Israel has
erased.’
All the work is for sale, with proceeds going to the artists and to support the museum. Because it is impossible to transport artwork out of Gaza, some of the pieces in the show are from artists who have been unable to evacuate are represented by prints based on digital images, not originals.
The exhibition will run for five weeks from 11am to 5pm, Monday to Saturday, until December 13th, and entry is free. The exhibition will move to Dublin in the
new year.
