2012, Olive Grove
THE ARTIST AS INSTITUTIONAL SUBSTITUTE
In the absence of museums, archives, and cultural ministries— the infrastructure that most societies use to house and transmit heritage— Palestinian artists took on a role that extended far beyond the canvas. They became, by necessity, the primary custodians of cultural memory.
Mansour is candid about whether this felt like a deliberate responsibility.“ I don’ t know if we consciously saw ourselves as custodians,” he says.“ But we felt compelled to engage with this heritage— to nurture it and preserve it.”
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The existence of a museum liberates the artist from the constraint of size,” he says, recalling how, during the occupation, canvases had to be small enough to smuggle in a car trunk.“ With a museum, you can work at scale. Galleries alone are not enough.
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