Human rights and environmental activists demanding a ceasefire in Gaza have unfurled a giant picture of a Palestinian child crying for help, above the entrance to Madrid’s Reina Sofia Museum.
The protest action on Wednesday was organized by Greenpeace and the Unmute Gaza movement that supports photojournalists reporting from the besieged enclave.
The banner, illustrated by US street artist Shepard Fairey, also known as ‘Obey’, reads: “Can you hear us?” and has an “unmute” icon on the child’s face.
“The work pays homage to an image taken by Gazan photojournalist Belal Khaled, which shows a Palestinian child crying for help,” the Unmute Gaza movement said on its Instagram page.
To the applause and cheers of onlookers, a Ceasefire Now banner was hung beneath the image.
🔴🔴🔴ACCIÓN🔴🔴🔴
ALTO EL FUEGO EN GAZA YA
Escalamos la fachada del Museo Reina Sofía para desplegar una obra gigante del artista OBEY.
La imagen, de casi 60 m2, adapta una foto tomada en Gaza por el reportero palestino Belal Khaled con un mensaje:
¿NOS ESTÁIS OYENDO? pic.twitter.com/EAc7STie9R— Greenpeace España (@greenpeace_esp) January 24, 2024
The museum is internationally known for housing Pablo Picasso’s painting “Guernica”, “a symbol of the suffering of civilians in war,” the movement said.
“From now on, it will also be known for being the place where Greenpeace together with the Unmute Gaza movement called for an urgent and lasting ceasefire in the region,” it stated.
The painting was reportedly inspired by a Nazi air raid on the northern Spanish town of Guernica in 1937 that killed as many as 1,600 people and is widely considered one of the anti-war masterpieces of 20th-century art.
‘Image Illuminates Human Suffering’
In a December 18 post on his website, the street artist said he was “inspired to work from Belal Khaled‘s photo of a young boy who is crying out in pain from his injuries as blood runs down his face.”
“An image like this (and thousands of others) can strip away the superficial overlay of country, ethnicity, and religion and illuminate the basic human suffering that is happening in Gaza,” Fairey stated.
“I’m morally compelled to amplify the message of Belal’s photograph and his caption “CAN YOU HEAR US?”. Let’s hope that, for the sake of peace and humanity that, we can all hear and respond!”
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 25,700 Palestinians have been killed, and 63,730 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7.
Palestinian and international estimates say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
(The Palestine Chronicle)
