Destruction of Art and Humanity

During World War II, the Nazis occupied the island of Crete. The island’s inhabitants resisted. For every killed Wehrmacht soldier, the occupiers retaliated by blowing up an ancient sculpture. To the art-loving commander of the occupying forces, these sculptures were worth more than a human life. Their “death” was documented with commemorative plaques. This story was told to me by Lakis Jordanopoulos. Immediately, I thought of the Taliban, who, shortly before, had destroyed the world’s two largest Buddha statues. The contempt for humanity displayed by various totalitarian regimes and fundamentalist ideologies is strangely paralleled by a contempt for art, a disdain for human cultural creation.

As part of the Nimsavusturya exhibition, Hüseyin Isik carried out an explosive performance. A sculpture defaced with racist, sexist, nationalist, and other hateful slogans was blown up.

LYKIDOS