The pro-Israel lobby group, UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI), has struck again. Another event censored and shut down with its familiar playbook of intimidation to silence any criticism of Israel.
‘Drawings Against Genocide’
The London gallery hosting British artist Matthew Collings’ exhibition “Drawings Against Genocide” was forced to cancel the show just three days after announcing it.
Due to open mid-May at Delta House Studios in SW London, UKLFI sent a threatening letter, citing “concerns of alleged antisemitic content”, directly to the building’s owners.
Collings has been batting off these accusations since the same show exhibited in Margate in March, using Instagram to refute the claims. Through his social media posts, he continues to emphasise what he has and has not drawn:
What they claim is that I draw Jews as demons and Jews as monsters. And I don’t. I draw allegories of Zionism and Israeli violence.
The bold, coloured pencil drawings are Collings’ response to Israel’s abominable atrocities in Gaza. There are streams of blood, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu with an erection under “invade Iran” signs, and a soldier smiling cartoonishly over a skull – a mock of a photograph that went viral a year ago.
Israel’s security minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, historian and presenter Simon Schama and actor and comedian Jerry Seinfeld feature too. But not, as Collings points out, for being Jewish; they feature for their actions or positions on Gaza.
UKLFI’s shutdown tactics
UKLFI used the same shutdown tactics against Collings last year. They also sent a four-page letter, shown to the Canary, to the Joseph Wales Studios in Margate this year. Collings said that the gallery:
quite rightly ignored their nonsense.
Under investigation by the Charity Commission for misconduct, UKLFI has previously coerced Chelsea and Westminster Hospital to remove artwork connected to school children in Gaza, and maliciously targeted health workers, cultural institutions and universities to stop advocacy for Palestine.
This association of lawyers supporting Israel wields its power in the UK by claiming breach of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, which is not legally binding in the UK.
Artist and studio manager Michael Hall, who worked with Collings and Art For a Free Palestine to host at Delta House Studios, said he was “absolutely fuming” that owners Pineapple Corporation enforced the position to cancel:
I was extremely angry that people should censor it. I don’t believe in censorship.
Media fuelling the fire
In March, Sunday Telegraph columnist Zoe Strimpel took to X to rage against Collings’ show. This set off the Israel-cheering right-wing media – from GB News to the Jewish Chronicle – to pounce, echoing the antisemitic claims.
The resulting hate mail – including “obscene and very, very violent” messages from members of the public – hasn’t stopped, he says.
Collings was initially shocked by Strimpel’s “hysterical” outburst in Margate and then “baffled” by her fabricated storytelling.
Strimpel claimed she was “hounded, barked at, interrupted, cut off, ridiculed, jeered at”, as she called the art “illegal”. According to Collings:
no one had really noticed her there [until she] started acting out a charade at being thrown out.
He adds:
Her story became ever more elaborated and I said, ‘you’re a Zionist. You’re defending a genocide’.
When they come at me with their aggressive paranoid fantasies of things they want to believe so they can be angry, I am both sort of shocked and bewildered by what they’re saying, but not surprised. Being assailed is jarring. But the irrationalism, insults, lack of any argument – well, we hear it all the time from Zionists.
Collings, once a familiar face on TV art shows and a supporter of Palestinian rights for decades, remains defiant in the face of coordinated campaigns to silence him:
I’m going to be touring [that show] forever now, for at least as long as there’s activism that needs to be done.
Calling out complicity
It’s not just Israeli crimes against the Palestinians that Collings is outraged about; it’s also the art world’s “stony silence” in response to it.
Not the unknown artists who speak out but the famous figures “who won’t admit anything is going on”:
Artists who we’ve been told are rebels against the establishment, are free and spontaneous and express the truth in their art, all shut the fuck right up when it comes to Israel and Zionism – they don’t say a word.
They want to protect their money, and that is the only reason they’re quiet about it.
They know immediately [when] they speak out, they will start to lose shows, collectors won’t buy them so much, they’ll lose prestige, and that all means money – that’s the only accounting for it.
The art world has shown itself to be callously cynical and opportunist with no values whatsoever. It’s the worst side of liberalism, pure hypocrisy.
International artists Banksy, Nan Goldin, Candice Breitz, Jake Chapman and Peter Kennard, he says, are:
really, really important exceptions [that] break this rule and are outspoken.
The heart of the matter
This 130-piece exhibit hasn’t just been a way for Collings to process what he’s been bearing witness to, but “for anyone who feels horrified”:
You must read Ilan Pappé and other great writers on the history of Palestine, of course. But that’s not the only way to process information. It’s not the only way to examine your feelings.
He adds:
I want people who see it to recognise there are others who feel the same.
Collings plans to find a new venue, unfazed by the bullies, and continue spotlighting Israeli atrocities and their defenders.
Featured images via Matthew Collings
By The Canary
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