Belvedere 21
-by bita bell
Dear Belvedere 21,
Can you please tell us
how you removed the line
“Firas from Palestine and
Ali from Lebanon”?
Did you use your bare hands?
Did you scratch it off with your nails?
Did you use any tools?
What tools did you use?
Were they sharp?
Could they cut? And then, once the line
was off the wall,
did you tear it into pieces?
Did you crumble it?
Did you throw it in the trash?
Where is it now?
Where is “Firas from Palestine
and Ali from Lebanon” now?
What did you do to
“Firas from Palestine and
Ali from Lebanon”?
The Myth of the Liminal Old-Growth was an installation created by Joanna Zabielska, Zosia Hołubowska, and Alma Bektas in collaboration with Improper Walls for the Über das Neue exhibition at Belvedere 21 in Vienna. The installation drew on Slavic mythology, particularly the figures of Perun, Veles, and Leshy while incorporating documentary footage, including testimonies from refugees at the Polish-Belarussian border. The work also featured the poem Conversation with a Stone by Polish poet Wisława Szymborska, followed by a dedication on the wall: "Dedicated to Firas from Palestine and Ali from Lebanon, and all the people suffering from forced displacement whose names we do not know and whose stories have gone untold." However, the curatorial team at Belvedere 21 removed the dedication from the wall without the artists' permission, censoring the names and identities of the two refugees who inspired the artwork.
bita bell is a dance artist and composer with a BA in music composition and a MFA in dance, based in Vienna.