[News] MoMA Shutters as 500+ Protesters Infiltrate Atrium in Support of Palestine

[Anti-Imperialist News]

hyperallergic.com
<https://hyperallergic.com/871345/moma-shutters-as-500-protesters-infiltrate-atrium-in-support-of-palestine/>
MoMA Shutters as 500+ Protesters Infiltrate Atrium in Support of Palestine
Rhea Nayyar
February 10, 2024
------------------------------
Activists took over the Museum of Modern Art's second-floor atrium for a
massive demonstration. (all photos Rhea Nayyar/*Hyperallergic* unless
otherwise noted)

The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in Manhattan unexpectedly closed its
galleries to the public at around 3:45pm Saturday, February 10, after over
500 pro-Palestinian protesters took over the building’s second-floor atrium
for a massive demonstration. By some organizers’ estimates, more than 800
activists filled the museum.

Co-organized by several advocacy groups and activists, the demonstration
included a variety of tactics. Starting at 3:30pm, organizers split up to
distribute over 1,000 custom-printed imitation MoMA pamphlets calling out
five museum trustees — Leon Black
<https://hyperallergic.com/tag/leon-black/>, Larry Fink
<https://hyperallergic.com/tag/larry-fink/>, Paula Crown
<https://hyperallergic.com/649814/protesters-convene-at-moma-to-denounce-police-violence-in-colombia/>,
Marie-Josée Kravis
<https://hyperallergic.com/844996/moma-closes-during-climate-protests-against-board-chair/>,
and Ronald S. Lauder — and their alleged financial and corporate
investments into Israeli military weaponry and surveillance technology,
real estate, and foreign support groups. Shortly afterwards, hundreds of
demonstrators began a sit-in in the atrium.

A group of demonstrators unveiled a banner from the second floor
overlooking the museum’s lobby and rear exit that read “MoMA Trustees Fund
Genocide, Apartheid, and Settler Colonialism” for people on the first floor
to view.
The organizers called out MoMA trustees’ alleged financial ties to
financial and corporate investments in Israeli military efforts. The museum
closed its galleries to the public at around 3:45pm.

>From the third and fifth floors, additional banners — calling for an
immediate ceasefire, a free Palestine, and for all prisons to be emptied —
were launched from the viewing ledges, suspended alongside artist Carolina
Caycedo’s current display of fishing net sculptures.

“Free, free Palestine,” chanted protesters after the signs were unveiled,
followed by a group reading of a passage from the imitation pamphlet
addressed to visitors that elaborated on the premise of the protest and the
decision to criticize the museum specifically.

A 27-year-old illustrator and printmaker from Queens who participated in
the sit-in and asked to remain anonymous told *Hyperallergic* that they
learned about the protest on social media. “Our taxes are already going to
genocide,” they said. “The best thing that can come from this is people
canceling their memberships to MoMA and boycotting until the museum divests
from board members who fund genocide.”

“The museum should be a place for us New Yorkers, and a majority of us
aren’t on board with funding genocide,” the artist continued. “Cancel your
museum memberships, don’t pay for the $30 ticket.”

Within less than 15 minutes, MoMA security closed the galleries, began
turning away people who wanted to enter, and allowed visitors to exit.
Members of the press were allowed into the building at approximately
4:45pm. Around 5:15pm, organizers began to trickle out of the museum and
continued the protest outside, marching down Midtown Manhattan.
Protesters wave signs in a show of solidarity with Palestine in front of
the Brooklyn Museum. (photo Maya Pontone/*Hyperallergic*)

Today’s action at MoMA coincided with another demonstration that drew over
300 people outside the Brooklyn Museum, organized by Within Our Lifetime
Palestine (WOL Palestine). At least four protesters were arrested there, as
confirmed by *Hyperallergic* on the scene.

Both actions also happened at the same time as the release of an open letter
<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSd7dk_AIt_6USKTw9jSRI8mraKwOJQXmwNGq9zznBTyTh1V7A/viewform>
signed by more than 100 NYC cultural workers from organizations including
the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum, and the Studio Museum
protesting the “the disgraceful silence of our institutions as Israel
commits genocide in Gaza.”

“While the museums and cultural institutions of our city claim to hold
commitments to justice, social action, and equity, their silence has
rendered them complicit in the killing of over 27,000 people in Palestine,
with thousands more trapped under rubble from bombings since October 7,
2023,” the letter reads.

MoMA has not yet responded to *Hyperallergic*‘s request for comment.
At MoMA, banners were launched from the viewing ledges, suspended alongside
artist Carolina Caycedo’s current display of fishing net sculptures.


<https://hyperallergic.com/author/rhea-nayyar/>

Rhea Nayyar (she/her) is a New York-based teaching artist who is passionate
about elevating minority perspectives within the academic and editorial
spheres of the art world. Rhea received her BFA in Visual... More by Rhea
Nayyar <https://hyperallergic.com/author/rhea-nayyar/>
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