In the age of kings, court painters in France perfected the art of depicting Louis XIV in golden robes and towering wigs, while peasants died in the mud behind palace walls. Not one of them dared to paint the face of a starving child or an old man collapsing under crushing taxes. Art was nothing but a “loyal servant” to power, a brush polishing the image of the ruler.
Today, nothing has changed. Instead of royal courts, we now have galleries in New York and Paris. Instead of monarchs, we have the stars of “contemporary art,” selling an empty canvas titled “Existence”, or a black dot on a white background for a million dollars. Genius! As if telling a little girl searching for her mother under the rubble in Gaza: “Be patient, my dear, art is busy with abstraction right now.”
Art history has known faces that turned toward blood, and faces that shut their eyes. Take for example:
“Guernica” (Picasso, 1937):
a painting that screams against the bombing of a Spanish village, embodying the terror of war, and becoming an icon against fascism. But it was the exception in Picasso’s career he soon returned to his abstractions, mirrors, and muses, forgetting that Spain kept bleeding for decades under Franco.
“The Massacre at Chios” (Delacroix, 1824):
a canvas that captured the victims of the Ottoman slaughter in Greece, forcing all of Europe to confront the tragedy. Here, art bore witness to blood, turning it into a visual cry shaking the conscience.
“Liberty Leading the People” (Delacroix, 1830):
a painting of a bare breasted woman leading the French against oppression. A symbol that became universal for revolution and dignity.
Now compare: Which “modern” artist dared to paint a Palestinian child being pulled out from under the rubble? Which global painter raised a brush to declare: “This is Gaza’s blood, these are the faces of its children”? No one.
Instead, they are busy with “conceptual art,” where a banana duct-taped to a wall is celebrated as a masterpiece! Brilliant! As if telling a mother who lost her children to an airstrike: “Don’t worry, the world is applauding the banana.”
The most absurd part is when some of them justify their silence with the pathetic excuse: “Art shouldn’t be political.” Oh really? But art can advertise perfumes, luxury cars, and fashion brands highly political when sponsors pay well! Yet when the blood is Palestinian, the mask drops, and suddenly the artist is “neutral.”
Ladies and gentlemen, art that refuses to see Gaza refuses to see anything. Art that does not record Gaza’s massacre the way Guernica, Chios, and Paris 1830 were recorded, is blind art. Art without conscience. Art fit only for the waiting rooms of five star hotels.
History will not forgive these “stars.” Perhaps their works will hang in museums one day but not as icons of beauty. They will stand instead as documents of betrayal, proof of how art chose silence in the face of blood. And beneath them, the visitor will read a small plaque:
“This is what beautiful silence looked like, when Gaza was being slaughtered.”