Protesting “Art For Apartheid’s Sake,” a group of activists visited the Brooklyn Academy of Music on Wednesday evening — with signs and song the 80 protesters told BAM and the Batsheva Dance Company to “Stop Dancing Around Apartheid.”
Adalah-NY is joined by the Palestinian Dabke Brigades and the Rude Mechanical Orchestra in a protest of Batsheva Dance Company at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Batsheva used music from Star Wars in their performance, so here is our rendition of the struggle between good and evil!
Now and then, Ohad Naharin tells a journalist what he thinks about his country’s politics. “There is so much hatred,” he said to Anna Kisselgoff of the Times some years ago, “and I’m not talking about any particular group.” I think he is talking about a particular group, but that doesn’t mean that the other group likes him. Outside BAM last night was a group of pro-Palestinians, chanting and waving placards to the effect that BAM should not have invited a company from Israel.
New York, NY, March 7, 2012 – Eighty New York human rights activists and cultural workers gathered tonight to protest Israel’s Batsheva Dance Company’s performance at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). Calling on attendees to boycott Batsheva due to its complicity with Israeli human rights violations, activists sang, chanted, played music, and danced. Parodying a piece of Batsheva’s newest show, Hora, Adalah-NY was joined by the Columbia University Palestinian Dabke Brigades and the Rude Mechanical Orchestra in a costumed Star Wars-themed dance representing the struggle between good and evil. Protesters chanted, “Their range of motion cannot hide / Their support for apartheid!” and “BAM, you’ve got to draw the line / Freedom for Palestine!”
Attendees were handed mock programs, whose cover identifies Batsheva as a “cultural ambassador for Israel.” Inside, the program explains why the group is being boycotted, and celebrates artists who have respected the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) call, including Gil Scott Heron, Roger Waters, and Cassandra Wilson. Upon reading the program, one attendee remarked, “If I had known, I wouldn’t have bought my ticket.” Dozens of others stopped to watch from the steps of BAM. At 7:35 p.m., five minutes after the performance was scheduled to begin, BAM staff informed protesters that the music and chanting had delayed the start of the show.
In its opening statement of 2012, the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic & Cultural Boycott of Israel declares that "it is time to take a stand to end all forms of complicity with Israeli academic and cultural institutions; they are key partners in the Israeli regime of occupation, colonialism and apartheid." In the context of what PACBI has called "a year to further intensify academic boycott," this roundtable brings together faculty and activists in Canada and the United States who are active in the global BDS movement. Speakers will discuss challenges and openings in the current moment, as well as the importance of further transnationalizing BDS work. The roundtable will focus on the cultural and academic boycott in Canada and the United States.
Panelists: Cynthia Wright (York University), Riham Barghouti (PACBI, Adalah-NY), James Cairns (Wilfrid Laurier University, Brantford Campus), Sue Ferguson (Wilfrid Laurier University, Brantford Campus), Mary-Jo Nadeau (University of Toronto Mississauga), Alan Sears (Ryerson University)
In Mr. Naharin’s “Hora,” which is coming to the Brooklyn Academy of Music on Wednesday, dancers assert their individuality in virtuosic solos, only occasionally moving in sync. Instead of creating a dance of unity, Mr. Naharin, as he does in much of his work, explores the complicated dynamics of the individual within the group, rendering the classic hora completely unrecognizable, if not altogether erasing it.
Batsheva’s 2009 and 2010 tours to the United States met with calls for boycotts and protests from anti-Israel activists, who see the company as a type of ambassador for Israel because of its financial relationship to the government. More protests are planned for the company’s run at the Brooklyn Academy.
The Israeli contemporary dance company Batsheva has enthralled audiences internationally with its visceral choreography and raw style of movement. But the company is facing a less-than-warm welcome in many of the stops on its current five-week North American tour on account of the fact that it's partially backed by the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which funds a "Brand Israel" campaign to send artists overseas in order to "show Israel’s prettier face, so we are not thought of purely in the context of war."
The Palestine Solidarity Group-Chicago and the Chicago Movement for Palestinian Rights are urging Chicagoans to just say no to Batsheva Dance Company, based in Tel Aviv, Israel. Last week, in an open letter to Batsheva, Adalah-NY: The New York Campaign for the Boycott of Israel asked the company to "take a stand against the Israeli government’s violations of Palestinian rights."
