"على الثورة أن تعني الحياة": شِعر وفن لميسم غني في تورنتو

Editor's Note: This article was originally published as "Revolution Must Mean Life” – Maysam Ghani on September 20, 2022 by C Magazine, a contemporary art and criticism periodical. It is republished on our blog with permission.

Although many in the Palestinian diaspora may have never seen the Israeli West Bank wall in person, myself included, they are fully aware of its use as a tool for racial segregation, displacement, and apartheid against Palestinian peoples. The wall is famously covered in political messages, murals, and imagery in support of Palestinian resistance and the fight for liberation. These archetypal stencils of Palestinian motifs and political slogans were recreated over 9,000 km away at Whippersnapper Gallery in Toronto. Presented as a multimedia exhibition developed through Mayworks Festival’s Labour Arts Catalyst program, Palestinian poet Maysam Ghani collaborated with Labour4Palestine (a pan-Canadian network of labour activists) to produce “Revolution Must Mean Life.”

Mounted in the gallery’s storefront window, a street-facing video installation sits on the floor in front of walls filled with stencilled paintings. One stencil references political cartoonist Naji al-Ali’s iconic symbol of defiance: Handala. In the Handala sketch, a barefoot 10-year-old boy in tattered clothing stands with his hands clasped behind his back. During a gallery visit hosted by Ghani, along with Youssef Mutawe (who edited the exhibition’s video component), the public was invited to bring or make a poster that would be added to the adjoining walls. In the spirit of the ubiquitous Handala symbol that covers the West Bank barrier, by the end of Ghani and Mutawe’s gallery visit, visitors had created enough posters and stencils to fill two entire walls.

The video accompanying “Revolution Must Mean Life” blends historical and contemporary clips of various Palestinian villages and cities, including footage shot by Palestinian labour organizers based in Al Khalil, Nablus, Qalqilya, and Ramallah. These same organizers were also interviewed by Labour4Palestine, and the resulting conversations inspired Ghani’s accompanying spoken-word poem. In a particularly impactful moment set to the heartbeat rhythm of Mohammed William Al Shalalfeh’s drumming of the tabla, Ghani tells us how “the same state that utilizes labour to build their democracy manufactures the weapons of our destruction collectively,” over images of billowing black smoke surrounding a collapsing bombed building. Ghani, Labour4Palestine, Al Shalalfeh, and Mutawe created a moving exhibition that reminded publics of the importance of labour movements in shifting global support toward solidarity with Palestinian freedom.