Royal Academicians Jock McFadyen, Rana Begum, Vanessa Jackson, Tim Shaw, David Nash, Helen Sear, David Mach and Goshka Macuga are among hundreds of arts professionals condemning the Royal Academy of Arts’ anti-Palestinian censorship after it removed two artworks from its Young Artists’ Summer Show. In an open letter published today by Artists for Palestine UK, the…
The boycott of an iconic British arts venue has ended after it apologised for its anti-Palestinian censorship. The Arnolfini in Bristol said it was “truly sorry” for cancelling film and poetry events curated by Bristol Palestine Film Festival in November last year, and committed platforming Palestinian voices.
Portishead’s Geoff Barrow and Adrian Utley, Massive Attack’s Robert del Naja, writers Alice Oswald, Nikesh Shukla, Shon Faye, Travis Alabanza and Rachel Holmes are among many of Bristol’s artists who have written a letter accusing the iconic Arnolfini International Centre for Contemporary Arts of “censorship of Palestinian culture”.
More than 1,300 artists, including Academy Award winning Olivia Colman, Olivier Award winners Harriet Walter and Juliet Stevenson, BAFTA winners Aimee Lou Wood and Siobhán McSweeney, Paapa Essiedu (I May Destroy You), Susanne Wokoma (Enola Holmes), Youseff Kerkour (Napoleon), Nicola Coughlan (Derry Girls, Bridgerton) and Lolly Adefope (Ghosts, Loki), have launched a letter addressed to the arts and culture sector, that accuses cultural institutions across Western countries of:
“repressing, silencing and stigmatising Palestinian voices and perspectives”.
Israel and its allies are trying to build a wall of silence around their devastation of Gaza. Around the world, those who seek to break through it are having to contend with an extraordinary and shameful campaign of pressure and threats. No-one who speaks out, from the UN Secretary-General to a London tube-driver, is exempt. Yet the breakthrough has happened.
Artists for Palestine UK is shocked at reports that the Barbican told a Palestinian artist to avoid talking about freedom for Palestinians. Having welcomed a co-founder of Palestinian station Radio Alhara to give a talk on “the radical nature of radio”, the Barbican reportedly instructed him to “safeguard the audience” by keeping his comments about…
More than 180 actors, writers and producers have accused the jury of the 2022 European Drama Prize in Germany of “modern-day McCarthyism”, after it withdrew a Lifetime Achievement Award from renowned British playwright Caryl Churchill over her support for Palestinian rights.
The Tolpuddle Martyrs Festival, a trade union-organised ‘celebration of solidarity’, disinvited the pro-Palestinian artist following behind-the-scenes pressure.
We have obtained a full copy of the standard contract of the Yehoshua Rabinovich Foundation for the Arts’s Israel Cinema Project that filmmakers must sign before receiving funding. Rabinovich’s Cinema Project is Israel’s largest film fund. The Rabinovich Foundation obligates filmmakers to whitewash apartheid and ethnic cleansing.
More than a hundred artists, including Hollywood stars, acclaimed authors and prominent musicians, call for “meaningful measures to ensure accountability for the killing of Shireen Abu Akleh and all other Palestinian civilians”