The National Gallery of Australia has partially covered up expressions of Palestinian solidarity in a show of indigenous artists, citing ‘security concerns’.
According to an AAP report, items including a free Palestine T-shirt, which is featured in a wall hanging, a free Palestine fist patch and a protest badge have all been obscured by white peace flags.
Images obtained by the Guardian also show a tapestry in which a white piece of material has been placed over a Palestinian flag. Flags including those of the Torres Strait Islanders and West Papua flag remain visible in the textile collage. The Canberra museum says they only covered ‘protest material’ and there are still examples of the Palestinian flag visible.
The exhibition by the Pacific Indigenous art collective SaVĀge K’lub opened in June and is due to close next month, but the additional Palestinian material was only added two weeks ago.
The curator of the show, Rosanna Raymond, said she was censored before ‘reluctantly’ agreeing, while Nasser Mashni, president of the Australian Palestine Advocacy Network, told the Guardian that the move was ‘nothing less than a disgraceful act of censorship… rooted in political cowardice’.
