Nobody wants to be accused of fiddling whilst Rome burns, the fiddler the least of all. The war between Hamas and Israel has rightly motivated countless people to take a principled stand. The West’s artists, the professional fiddlers who are also by habit intensely political, have been no exception. Some of these fiddlers turned out to be arsonists. A peace letter sparked a spiral of events from which the community may never morally recover.
On 19 October, the US art magazine ArtForum published an open letter supporting Palestine and decrying the violence affecting civilians in Gaza. The text was signed by some 8,000 artists, curators and writers. Cultural figures like the anti-opioid activist Nan Goldin, gender theorist Judith Butler and Turner Prize winner Lawrence Abu Hamdan spoke of an “unfolding genocide” and accused Israel of “clear violation of international humanitarian law”.
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