A group of New York’s most renowned urban artists traveled through Israel’s Samaria region on Wednesday in a show of solidarity with the Jewish residents of the area.
Artists 4 Israel, a New York-based pro-Israel organization that utilizes art as a vehicle to educate the public on issues pertaining to the Middle East, brought Graffiti legends NICER, SKI, 2ESAE and SUE WORKS to Israel on a solidarity trip that has so far included encounters with the people of Sderot, Jewish refugees from the Gaza region, youth at risk in Jerusalem’s Neve Yaakov neighborhood and resistance activists in the hilltops of Samaria.
The New York group was joined in Israel by fellow Graffiti artists from Spain and France and were reportedly traveling through Samaria on Wednesday with activist Yehuda HaKohen of the Zionist Freedom Alliance.
The artists’ visit to Jewish communities in Samaria was especially meaningful as it came while the United States government is aggressively pressing Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu to renew the 10-month ban on all Jewish construction in the Judea and Samaria regions that had expired on September 26. The New York Graffiti writers’ presence and artwork in the area sent a message to local residents and resistance activists alike that not all American citizens support their government’s policies in the Middle East.
After painting a mural in the Pisgat Yaakov hilltop village overlooking Beit El and leaving their mark on roadblocks and bus stops up and down route 60, the artists arrived in the city of Ariel Wednesday night to break what they called “an artistic siege” against the over 18,000 people living there.
“Graffiti writers are used to making art where people tell them not to,” said Craig Dershowitz, Executive Director of Artists 4 Israel, “and when we told them what was happening in Ariel they jumped at the chance to help.”
Ariel’s troubles began in September when the city was a month away from completing a performing arts center. A group of three dozen Israeli actors and theater workers called for a boycott against the center because it is located in territory that the international community wants Israel to surrender to the Western-backed Palestinian Authority. Within days, 150 Israeli academics joined the boycott campaign and American stars, including Oscar-winning actress Vanessa Redgrave, Cynthia Nixon of “Sex and the City” and playwright Tony Kushner also voiced support.
The situation rapidly became a political firestorm when Prime Minister Netanyahu came out in support of Ariel, referring to the city as “the capital of Samaria” and saying that the boycott was an attempt to “cut into our flesh.”
The Graffiti writers, however, argue that the decision of the boycotting artists is cutting into something worse than flesh – it is attacking the essential human need for beauty. “When we heard of what was happening in Ariel, we said, ‘What? This is totally against what art is about,’” said NICER from the world famous TATS Crew. “Art is for people, not for politics.”
The artists plan to stay in Ariel until November 29 and will be creating murals all over the city, promising to transform local bomb shelters from drab grey structures into explosions of color. “We can’t take away the need for bomb shelters,” said Dershowitz. “But we can turn them into soaring works of beauty.” Local school children and teens from the community centers will also be joining in with free painting lessons from some of the greatest urban artists in the world.
