Sara Fenske Bahat, interim CEO of San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA), has resigned following intense backlash over the facility's handling of recent pro-Palestinian protests. .
The protests took place in mid-February and were led by artists participating in the exhibition. Bay Area Now 9 It was scheduled to run at the center from October 6 to May 5, 2023. During the protests, eight artists altered their exhibits to include pro-Palestinian messages. In a video circulating online, an artist spray-painted “Freedom for Palestine” on his sculpture and explained to the camera: “This museum is silencing us, so I am modifying my work to say Freedom for Palestine.”
The demonstrators also called on the museum to join the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), stop censoring the work of artists involved in the liberation of Palestine, and urge Zionist trustees and funders to join the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI). demanded an immediate cease-fire. Leaflets were distributed at an event held at the same time as the protest.
On February 21, the YMCA Board of Directors responded to the protest with a statement saying the flyer contained “a series of false accusations and unreasonable demands against the YBCA” and used language that was “neither productive nor acceptable.” He suggested that he had been.
Following this statement, museum officials published an open letter condemning the center's censorship of artists and activists and its “continued failure to recognize the pain, danger, and trauma of genocide.” The letter attracted hundreds of signatories.
On March 6, the YBCA Board of Directors issued a new statement announcing that it had “reluctantly accepted Sarah's resignation” and temporarily closed the exhibition.
The statement comments on their stance on the protests as follows:[Altering the work] It's not art. It's not a protest. That is completely wrong and unacceptable. We ignore the hateful aspects and do not address the rational aspects of someone's actions because they were presented as a package and then repeated on social media. ”
