Artist withdraws from MAXXI exhibition due to ‘relevance to Palestinian genocide’
A group of artists have withdrawn their works from an exhibition at one of Italy’s top contemporary art museums ahead of its opening this week, citing what the institution calls “links to the Palestinian genocide.”
These seven artists – Tania Bruguera, Dora Garcia, Phil Collins, Siniša Mitrović, Alessandra Saviotti and Gemma Medina – will be featured in the highly anticipated exhibition “1+1: Relationship Years”, which opens today at MAXXI in Rome. The exhibition, which also features works by Vanessa Beecroft, Maurizio Cattelan, Felix Gonzalez-Torres, Pierre Huyghe and Rirkrit Tiravanija, explores relational aesthetics, first theorized as a movement in 1998 by exhibition curator Nicolas Bourriaud.
In an open letter published on the website of Nero Editions, a publishing house specializing in artists’ books and museum catalogues, the artists wrote: “We are aware of MAXXI’s position on the ongoing genocide in Gaza and the brutal occupation of Palestine, as evidenced by its acceptance of funding and recent collaborations with Eni, Leonardo Spa and other entities directly involved in these atrocities.”
Leonardo and Eni are both Italian companies with ties to Israel. Leonardo is the EU’s largest arms manufacturer and one of the largest in the world, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). Eni, an energy technology company, was one of six companies to receive a license from the Israeli Ministry of Energy to explore natural gas in the Mediterranean in October 2023, according to a report from the Israeli Ministry of Energy. Reuters.
The open letter further explains that MAXXI “has a history of cooperation with companies directly involved in the genocide of the Palestinian people,” including Leonardo and Eni. This autumn, Eni supported MAXXI’s commissioned work for Italian artist Maurizio Nannucci at Gazometro G3 in the Eni complex in Rome. Additionally, the letter’s footnote cites four Israel-related projects that MAXXI has organized over the past few years, further demonstrating the institution’s support for Israel, such as the 2018 exhibition “Tel Aviv, the White City” and an event in February 2024 titled “October 7, 2023: Israel Burns.”
The artists’ statement continued: “This deeply disturbing practice is far from an isolated case, but part of a broader and persistent pattern of institutional co-optation that reveals the role museums play in legitimizing Zionist propaganda and narratives, thereby systematically erasing Palestinian culture, history, and life. We find it unacceptable to display our work in this context.”
In addition to the artist’s withdrawal statement, five anti-Zionist activist groups – Galassia Antisionista, Vogliamo Tutt’Altro, BDS Roma, Il Campo Innocente, ANGA—Added own statement. They noted that Italy is Israel’s third-largest arms supplier, after the United States and Germany, according to a 2024 SIPRI study.
“We will not allow our work to serve institutions that support and whitewash the destruction of communities, the desertification of ecosystems, and the disenfranchisement of Palestinians,” the activist group wrote in the letter. “Art is not neutral. As long as museums do not take a clear public stance on genocide and sever partnerships with entities that profit from Zionist colonization of Palestine, artists should not be working with MAXXI.”
The groups launched boycotts of several Italian cultural institutions in April this year, including MAXXI, the Miart art fair and the Rome museum Palazzo delle Esposizioni.
It’s unclear whether the artist’s work will actually be removed from the exhibition. art newsMultiple requests to confirm its retraction and comment to MAXXI went unanswered.
In their statement, the artists called on others to join the boycott of MAXXI until it “unequivocally condemns the Israeli genocide in Gaza and the colonization of Palestine and commits to severing all ties with companies complicit in crimes against humanity.”
Their statement added: “Given that MAXXI We cannot in good conscience collaborate with such an institution and therefore collectively withdraw from the exhibition. This decision underlines our belief that as artists we must be held accountable for the injustices that our work may be used to justify, legitimize and artistically cleanse. The struggle for Palestinian liberation will not end with the so-called current ‘peace plan’ used as a thinly veiled excuse for continued oppression and colonial expansion. We must act accordingly and continue to make our voices clear and clear about what we stand for and what we stand against. “
