Mural Depicting Hostages Noa Argaman and Avinatan Or in Milan Painted Over
Translated & summarized from N12 by baba
A mural in Milan, Italy, featuring Israeli hostages Noa Argaman and Avinatan Or, was painted over less than a month after its creation. The artwork by Italian artist Alessandro Palombo was removed during a repainting of a wall near the Gallery of Modern Art. The reasons for the repainting, especially given the wall's prior neglect, are unclear. Israel's Ambassador to Italy condemned the act as a serious display of antisemitism and an attempt to erase memory.
The story in 5 lines · by baba
- A Milan mural depicting Israeli hostages Noa Argaman and Avinatan Or was painted over less than a month after its creation.
- The artwork by Italian artist Alessandro Palombo was removed during a repainting of a wall near the Gallery of Modern Art.
- The circumstances of the repainting, including whether it was pre-planned, remain unclear.
- Israel's Ambassador to Italy condemned the act as a serious display of antisemitism.
- The mural's removal follows previous vandalism of the artist's works addressing historical tragedies.
A mural in Milan, Italy, that depicted the abduction of Israeli hostages Noa Argaman and Avinatan Or during the October 7th Hamas attack has been painted over less than a month after its creation. The artwork, by Italian artist Alessandro Palombo, was removed as part of a repainting of an entire wall near the city's Gallery of Modern Art. The mural, which was on a six-meter-high wall in the Villa Reale gardens, showed Argaman and Or being kidnapped from the Nova music festival. The circumstances surrounding the decision to repaint the wall, which had reportedly been neglected for years and bore previous graffiti, remain unclear. It is not yet known if the maintenance work was planned before the mural's creation or decided upon afterward.
The action is attributed to Milan municipal authorities, though the specific department that commissioned and approved the work has not been officially identified. Israel's Ambassador to Italy, Yonatan Peled, condemned the act on social media platform X, calling it a "very serious act" that exposes "worrying faces of antisemitism and an attempt to rewrite the memory of that disaster." He added, "Remembering the victims is a duty that cannot be silenced."
Jewish community media outlets in Italy, including "Shalom" of the Rome Jewish community and "Mosaico" of the Milan Jewish community, also reported on the mural's removal. This incident follows previous instances where Palombo's works, often addressing Holocaust remembrance and the October 7th events, have been vandalized. Some of these past incidents were deemed antisemitic.
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