On Sunday, the Brooklyn Museum held a fair where a vendor was selling printed items bearing the phrase “River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free,” which some have long said is antisemitic and calls for the demise of the Jewish state of Israel.
The same Zine Fair vendor also offered for sale a second print item with the caption, “From NYC to Gaza, globalize the intifada,” and a picture of an NYPD car on fire.
A non-profit artists organization named Printed Matter, Inc. hosted the event, which included 60 exhibitors and was titled “Copy Machine Manifestos: Artists Who Make Zines.”
Algemeiner.com was the first to report on the existence of an anti-Israel print, which was then distributed by pro-Israel organizations like United With Israel. An infuriated guest snapped pictures of the offending images and shared them on social media.
Brooklyn Museum Zine Fair sells anti-Israel 'River to the Sea' merch. Will they be all arrested. I bet not. https://t.co/RHU7OxHknt
— Mike Ponti (@PontiMike) November 23, 2023
In a statement posted on its website, the Brooklyn Museum – which is supported by public funds and is located close to the Hasidic Jewish Lubavitchers’ global headquarters – tried to disassociate itself from what it described as the “antisemitic” content on exhibit at its location.
“Any anti-Semitic views expressed did not represent the views and values of the Brooklyn Museum. We want to be clear that we condemn hate, intolerance, or violence of any kind and are appalled by both the growing anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, as well as the divisions that are gripping the world. As a public institution, we are giving care to reviewing our policies while remaining committed to freedom of artistic expression and striving to create spaces for all to see themselves and others with dignity,” the museum added.
The Brooklyn Museum is no stranger to such controversy and is well known for displaying provocative art. In 1999 a scandal erupted when the Museum exhibited a painting by Chris Ofili, a British artist of Nigerian descent, as part of the Sensation show. The painting depicted the Virgin Mary as a black woman with a breast made of elephant dung and surrounded by cutouts of female buttocks from porn magazines. The painting provoked the outrage of then-Mayor Rudy Giuliani and also outraged the Catholic League. Giuliani considered it blasphemous and tried to cut off the museum’s funding and evict it from its building. The museum defended its right to display the artwork and sued the city for violating the First Amendment. The case became a symbol of the tension between artistic freedom and public decency.
Major sponsors of the current zine show were the Andy Warhol Foundation, Catie Marron, Kathy Fuld, Elyse and Lawrence B. Benenson, and the Brooklyn Museum’s Contemporary Art Committee. Additional funding came from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
