Residents of Hebron woke up Thursday to discover their city painted in bright colors. For the past two days 15 artists from the US and Europe have been hard at work painting large-scale graffiti art on bulletproof cement walls, homes, and IDF bases.
Craig Dershowitz, a Jewish resident of Manhattan and the president of Artists4Israel, told Ynet that most of the artists who worked with him on the project were not even Jewish. "We have no political message," he said.
Danny Cohen, Chabad envoy to Hebron, met some of the group members by chance two years ago, when they painted over Sderot, and invited them to the city.
"They had no trouble with the fact that this is Hebron, because these guys have a goal – which I very much agree with – to take places that have a bad reputation, and are associated with fear and chaos, and insert a little color into them," Cohen said.
The artists were confronted with violence just once, outside the city's Kasbah, where Palestinian youths threw stones at them.
"I was sure the incident would put an end to this beautiful project, but this unpleasant occurrence only increased their motivation and the guys just continued to paint. They have this message, 'Art and color will vanquish all stones'," Cohen said.
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Thursday, May 19, 2011
Artists4Israel paint Hebron
From YNet: