Street artists from around the world are joining photojournalists in showing solidarity while they cover Israel’s war on Gaza.
Among those participating is Shepard Fairey, renowned for his Barack Obama “HOPE” poster. He and many other artists have joined the Unmute Gaza project that aims to amplify the work of local photojournalists on the ground in Gaza, where international media are banned.
Fairey and others are translating harrowing images from Gaza into paintings and sketches, adding a mute symbol. These pieces of art can be downloaded for free from the project’s website. People are encouraged to print and display them in their own cities to raise awareness of the conflict.
Images that were taken by Belal Khaled were reimagined by street artist Ernest Zacharevic and are now on display in Penang, Malaysia.
Unmute Gaza / Antoine Loncle
“By creating artworks based on the images of these professional photojournalists, we wish to build a bridge between our community of artists and those facing death every second in Gaza,” said the Unmute Gaza collective, which is providing their time and resources for free. They wrote on Instagram that it’s “a simple way to support while showing the truth of what is happening.”
Fairey said he decided to join the initiative “because I’m a pacifist,” he wrote on his website.
Street artist Shepard Fairey’s reworking of a photograph by Belal Khaled.
Unmute Gaza
In November 2023, Unmute Gaza activists displayed banners with recreations of photos taken by Khaled and Mahmoud Bassam from the third floor of the Guggenheim Museum in New York City. Since then, artists’ reworked images have appeared in 80 cities across 29 countries — from Bogota, Colombia, to Bristol, England.
draw attention to their campaign.” width=”720″ height=”405″ src=”https://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/65a7cd502200003500fb03d2.jpg?ops=scalefit_720_noupscale”/>Unmute Gaza members unfurled banners in the Guggenheim Museum in New York to draw attention to their campaign.
Unmute Gaza
Last week, environmental activist organization Greenpeace joined Unmute Gaza to unfurl a gigantic banner featuring Fairey’s interpretation of Khaled’s image on Madrid’s Reina Sofia Museum, the home of Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica” painting, symbolizing the suffering of civilians in war.
“By reimagining a harrowing image as a piece of art, we hope to raise awareness and support the people of Gaza during this difficult time,” Greenpeace’s executive director Eva Saldaña said in a statement sent to HuffPost.