Ein Aufruf aus Ägypten

Die 7. Berlin Biennale unterstützt diesen Aufruf, der sie über den Künstler Ganzeer erreichte.

This is an appeal to help save lives. The Egyptian Military Council has unleashed a brutal crackdown on peaceful protests by the Egyptian people, calling for the resignation of the military council and a cancellation of the sham elections that they’ve been running under their supervision. Soldiers have shown us no mercy, hitting fallen women with their batons, stomping on skulls with their boots, and shooting unarmed civilians dead. I’ve seen this happen with my own eyes and was unable to stop it. It’s a soul-shattering pain like no other.

The lies being disseminated by military-controlled media are as equally painful. Nothing hurts more than such shameless injustice. I fear the military’s strategy will only lead my country to an armed civil war. In an effort to keep our struggle peaceful, I hear by call on artists everywhere to support the Egyptian revolution with their art. As the genius that is Alan Moore once said, “[a satire] destroys you in the eyes of your community, it shows you up as ridiculous, lame, pathetic, worthless, in the eyes of your community, in the eyes of your family, in the eyes of your children, in the eyes of yourself, and if it's a particularly good bard, and he's written a particularly good satire, then three hundred years after you're dead, people are still gonna be laughing."

Our only hope right now is to destroy the military council using the weapon of art. From January 13 to 25, the streets of Egypt will see an explosion of anti-military street-art. If you are a street artist elsewhere in the world, please do what you can in your city to help us. Even if you are not a street-artist. If you’re a comic book artist, a musician, or filmmaker, whatever artistic talent you have can be of big help. If you can do something before the designated date, please do! We need all the help we can get.

Finding “inspiration” is not at all difficult. A quick visit to scaf-crimes.blogspot.com will do the trick. On behalf of Egypt’s street-art community, allow me to thank anybody in the world willing to help. Your art may very well save lives.

Ganzeer, Cairo

Not exactly a graphic designer, nor a product designer, Ganzeer is not particularly a street-artist or comic book artist, nor is he an installation artist, writer, speaker, or video-maker. But he’s had the chance to assume one of those roles at different periods of time and in different locations around the world, while remaining tight to his hometown of Cairo, Egypt. More info is available at www.ganzeer.com

Ein Auszug aus einer E-Mail von Ganzeer:

I've seen soldiers kill people in the movies. I've even seen them do it on the news. I never thought the day would come when I would see it in person. Those fellow Egyptians who haven't had the luxury of seeing these atrocities first hand are incredibly skeptical. They can't help but ask "why now?"

We're in a very critical point in our revolution right now. The point where military command has–after over 9 months of work—managed to alter the consciousness of officers enough to get them to attack their own people, arguing that "they're not the same revolution crowd." The argument has even managed to influence many within Egypt's society, bent on believing that the military has the people's best interest in mind, just because Mubarak is allegedly out of the picture.

People also can no longer afford to revolt, or stage a sit-in for months on end. The military's strategies since this whole revolution started have been a series of multiple blows at the livelihoods of Egyptians. If I'm finding it difficult to pay my own rent, I can only imagine what it must be like for those in positions less fortunate than mine.

They're frightening the Egyptian people. They're frightening them with the economy, with the Islamists, and with "hidden foreign interests." They went to force us into submission so things remain unchanged. These strategies may have worked on the Egyptians back in 1952. But today things are different. Our knowledge and understanding of the world is heightened and many of us will not go down without a fight.

We're being pushed into the direction of a civil war. A Syrian version of the revolution doesn't seem too far-fetched for Egypt anymore. I feel our last line of peaceful defense is art. Powerful art. From January 13 to 25, together with the help of other Egyptian artists and activists, we will raid the streets of Cairo with critical street-art like no other. We will use our knowledge of the arts to lay a curse on Egypt's military council, destroying them in the eyes of the community, the eyes of their families, and the eyes of themselves. I feel the more the art, the more powerful the curse. Let international artists unite for this cause. If artists everywhere do something in their town, in their city to criticize the Egyptian Military Council, raising global awareness on the matter ... I'm hoping some military men within the ranks will want to distance themselves from such a curse ... and will be inspired enough to arrest Egypt's Military council, freeing the Egyptian people from their tyranny. Let's curse theme ... and show the world what we can do without weapons.