LOS ANGELES — In pouring rain, a group of 20 unaffiliated cultural workers gathered to protest the United States’s continued funding of Israel’s attacks on Gaza. Citing Frieze partner Deutsche Bank’s ties to Israel, the organizers rallied outside of the fair entrance at Santa Monica Airport during peak visiting hours on Saturday, March 2 from 11am to 2pm.
At the busy intersection of Bundy Drive and Airport Avenue, where designated fair parking begins, many fairgoers drove by honking and cheering with fists out their windows as protesters held signs that read “Let Gaza Live,” “Deutsche Bank Invests in Genocide,” and “Decolonization is more than just a buzz word in a press release.”
“I’m protesting today because I’m horrified every day when I look at the news and see the cruelty and injustice that’s happening in Gaza and the West Bank,” 39-year-old artist Nina Sarnelle from Arlington Heights told Hyperallergic. “We as Americans have power and we’re not using it in the way we could be. And that’s why we need to be out here.”
Another protester, 40-year-old LA local Evan Apodaca, stated that “art is used as a vehicle to hide wealth” and shared his experiences of being silenced by the cultural sector for his expressions of Palestinian support.
“As someone who has been censored for my artwork about militarism and asked to remove mention of ‘Palestine’ by art galleries, I start to question how anyone can express themselves if you can’t express solidarity for the liberation of a people whose murders are bought and sold by the most oppressive regimes in the world,” Apodaca said.
Deutsche Bank, the primary financial sponsor of Frieze, has several locations in Israel and has provided loans to real estate corporations who are responsible for selling properties forcibly taken from Palestinian homeowners and sold to Israeli settlers in the West Bank.
“We’re out here today because the silence from the art world has been incredibly loud,” a protester who preferred to remain anonymous told Hyperallergic. “There’s a lot of power concentrated in the art world — a lot of money passes through — and Frieze is sponsored by Deutsche Bank, who on the record has given money to different groups like the Azrieli real estate developer in Israel. The fact that the art world continually chooses opulence and cowardice is disappointing.”
Deutsche Bank has not yet responded to an immediate request for comment.
Later on Saturday, a contingent of protesters made their way to Felix Art Fair at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood. At the pool in the center of the show, two artists unveiled the same banner reading “What Good Is Art That Ignores Genocide?” while standing silently for 10 minutes with one hand raised, palm painted red. Many visitors took photos. As hotel staff approached the artists, they chanted “free, free Palestine!” and fell backwards into the pool, floating on their backs for another 10 minutes in a “die in.”
At Frieze, protesters moved to the ticket holder entrance of the fair as participants filed in and out, including actor Jane Fonda. Asked by Hyperallergic for her thoughts on the protest, Fonda replied, “What protest?”
Frieze staffers welcomed visitors to the fair as protesters chanted, “What good is art that ignores genocide?”
“It goes above my couch!” replied one man entering the show.
“Go to a concert to yell!” another responded.
“Fuck you!” screamed one man wearing a Burberry trench coat as he moved through the crowd. “Fuck you all!”
A few exiting fairgoers joined in the protest, yelling and clutching the neon green maps of militarization in southern California made and distributed by the group.
“I was very happy to see this when I got here to be honest,” said Oscar Mendoza, 39, who was visiting the fair with family. “I think it’s absolutely necessary.”
