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January 17, 2022 4:27 pm
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Top German Art Show Embroiled in Antisemitism Row Over Participation of Pro-BDS Organizations

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avatar by Ben Cohen

Display boards in the German city of Kassel advertising tickets for the 15th Documenta art festival in 2022. Photo: Reuters/DPA

One of the world’s leading festivals of modern art was embroiled in a row over antisemitism on Monday, linked to the participation of organizations that advocate for a comprehensive boycott of Israel.

The supervisory board of the Documenta festival — a three-month long art event that begins in June in the German city of Kassel — was examining allegations from a local activist group, the Kassel Alliance Against Antisemitism, that two of the participating organizations actively support subjecting Israel to a campaign of boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS). The Bundestag, Germany’s federal parliament, passed a motion in May 2019 that decried the BDS campaign as antisemitic and urged the government to regard organizations advocating Israel’s elimination, or a boycott of Israel, as ineligible for state funding.

One of the groups identified is the curator of the fifteenth edition of the Documenta festival, a widely respected showcase for contemporary art that takes place in Kassel every five years. Ruangrupa — a collective of artists based in the Indonesian capital of Jakarta — is alleged to support a cultural boycott of Israel. Two of its representatives, Ada Darmawan and Farid Rakun, have signed onto petitions and open letters advocating the boycott.

A second group participating in the festival, the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center located in the Palestinian city of Ramallah, has repeatedly expressed support for boycotts of artistic events in Israel. The center is named in honor of Khalil al-Sakakini, a Palestinian scholar who lived in Jerusalem prior to Israel’s creation in 1948 and was openly sympathetic to Nazi Germany.

“Groups and individuals who support the BDS movement and similar boycott initiatives against Israel must not be given a place in an exhibition that is largely financed by public funds,” the Kassel Alliance Against Antisemitism declared in a statement last week.

The minister for art in the state of Hesse, where Kassel is located, expressed hope that the dispute would be quickly resolved by Documenta’s board. “I am confident that we will arrive at a good decision,” Angela Dorn told the DPA news agency on Monday.

Members of the Bundestag also voiced concern that the Documenta festival’s reputation would be tainted through an association with antisemitic ideas and groups.

“People who propagate the end of Israel must not be given a stage at the Documenta,” Frank Müller-Rosentritt — a member of the Bundestag’s foreign affairs committee from the liberal FDP Party — told the Bild news outlet.

“It cannot be that the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Center, which is named after a Hitler sympathizer and which supports BDS, is taking part in Germany’s largest art exhibition,” he continued. “Culture must contribute to understanding and not to hatred of Jews and Israel.”

Claudia Roth, an MP from the Green Party who serves as Minister of State for Culture, said separately that she had been in contact with festival organizers.

“The Documenta board must investigate these allegations,” Roth told the Juedische Allgemeine news outlet. “I have been involved in the fight against racism and antisemitism for decades. That’s why I got in touch with the sponsors of the Documenta, the federal state of Hesse and the city of Kassel.”

Launched in 1955 by Arnold Bode, a curator whose mission was to acquaint the German public with the modern art banished during the Nazi era, the Documenta festival is now ranked alongside the Venice Biennale as one of the world’s leading art shows.

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