Lebanese Australian artist Khaled Sabsabi has blamed Artistic Australia for the “dismantling” of his profession and mentioned the board’s choice to revoke his appointment as Australia’s Venice Biennale consultant has given the inexperienced mild for others to smear his fame.
In his first interview since being dumped from the celebrated artwork exhibition in February and simply days after Monash College “indefinitely postponed” one other exhibition he was due to participate in, Sabsabi instructed Guardian Australia the board’s “kneejerk” response has affected his emotional and bodily wellbeing, household and profession.
“Nobody should have to go through this torture,” he mentioned.
“It’s unfair and it’s put on by Creative Australia and those people that made that decision … essentially gave the go-ahead to define me as somebody who I am not.
“It’s actually dismantling my career, but also more broadly, anyone else’s career who may possibly engage with critically towards a political position or a political opinion.”
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Khaled Sabsabi speaks on the injury of being dumped from the Venice Biennale
Sabsabi and Michael Dagostino, an skilled curator, have been final 12 months chosen because the profitable workforce from dozens of candidates in an open name course of to showcase a brand new work on the Australia pavilion in Venice in 2026.
Simply days after their choice was made public in February and following adverse media and political commentary about two of Sabsabi’s historic artworks, Artistic Australia’s board rescinded their contract, saying it wished to keep away from a “prolonged and divisive debate”.
Sabsabi mentioned the rushed transfer left the pair in “shock and disbelief” and the board ought to have accomplished extra to guard them in opposition to “misinformation” surrounding his creative imaginative and prescient and follow.
“When the decision was made, I went through a period of three weeks, I was having nightmares, I couldn’t sleep,” he mentioned.
Responding to the furore over his again catalogue, Sabsabi mentioned the artworks had been taken out of context by journalists and politicians and mentioned Liberal senator Claire Chandler’s claims that he was selling terrorism, antisemitism and glorifying violence have been “disgusting”.
“It really infuriated me to actually read how people were misrepresenting my works,” he mentioned.
“Those works were viewed by over 80,000 people collectively and not one criticism or complaint from the public.”
Sabsabi mentioned he does “not support or endorse any form of terrorism or racism or antisemitism or Islamophobia”.
“I’m a Sufi or tasawwuf follower … where you prioritise humanity over organised religions,” he mentioned.
Sabsabi mentioned Thank You Very A lot – his 2006 work which used archival footage of the 9/11 assaults alongside a clip of George Bush saying “thank you very much” – was made the identical 12 months the previous president admitted US troops had not discovered weapons of mass destruction in Iraq whereas Sabsabi was working as a settlement employee supporting Iraqi refugees in western Sydney.
“It [was] made 20 years ago and it’s a critique of the brutalisation and the savageness of war,” he mentioned.
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“If people actually watch the 18-second video work, they will realise when those images of the horrific terrorist attack that was taking place … they’ll hear screams of torment and torture.
“It looked at the power of media and how media can be used as a form of propaganda … that changed the way we see the world, the way we stereotype Muslims.”
Equally, he mentioned the paintings You (2007), which is held within the MCA’s assortment and included footage of former Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah declaring “divine victory” in an deal with after the 34-day Lebanon-Israel conflict, was additionally stripped of essential context.
He mentioned the paintings was made as he grappled with the dimensions of destruction precipitated to his delivery nation and the paintings was designed to have been seen alongside a companion paintings which contained Quranic calligraphy.
“The idea was you walk into this space, into this experience, and you were physically put in a position: do I go to the right or do I go to the left?”
“So these are the sort of provocations that are instilled in my work.”
Artistic Australia didn’t reply to detailed questions from Guardian Australia in regards to the impression its choice has had on Sabsabi’s profession, however referred to feedback made by its CEO, Adrian Collette, at Senate estimates final month that the choice to take away Sabsabi and Dagostino was “not a reflection on the artistic team recommended for Venice”.
Sabsabi and Dagostino final week launched a public fundraising marketing campaign to help their efforts to independently exhibit their proposed exhibition at Venice, if efforts to have them reinstated fail.
“This particular work is so important because it looks at Abrahamic religions and commonalities across those as well,” he mentioned.
The pair mentioned their deliberate work will discover themes of id, migration and resilience.
