The MAXXI, Italy’s first national museum dedicated to contemporary arts, has long been the subject of criticism for its role in legitimizing a narrative perceived as racist, anti-Palestinian, and complicit with Israel’s colonial policies. Hence the call for a boycott, part of a broader movement aimed at exposing the complicity of cultural institutions in the genocide of the Palestinian people—an appeal that resonates in the work “MAXXI BOYCOTT” by the artist Sara Leghissa.
The artist’s voice has thus joined the discussion; she was recently invited to present a work at MAXXI L’Aquila. Her first instinct was to decline the invitation, in adherence to the museum boycott. She then chose to turn the occasion into a political action: to use the public space in front of the museum for a poster installation explaining the reasons for the boycott.
The text prepared by Leghissa denounces the link between Zionism, the art system, and the arms industry, highlighting the responsibility of MAXXI and Italian cultural institutions in normalizing colonial violence. “I don’t know whether an act of direct boycott would have been more effective,” the artist writes, “I’m making an attempt, also within collective discourses and forms of struggle.”
The fee for the work will be donated to an anti-Zionist organization that openly advocates for the liberation of the Palestinian people. This choice underscores how art can be a tool for struggle and awareness, rather than a mere ornament of a system that supports war.
