MUSEUMS ON PALESTINE: A SEMINAR ON SOCIALLY ENGAGED PRACTICES
MUSEUMS ON PALESTINE: A SEMINAR ON SOCIALLY ENGAGED PRACTICES
NOVEMBER 26 AND 27, 2025
SCHOOL FOR 5 (CROATIAN SCHOOL MUSEUM GALLERY), HEBRANGOVA 5, ZAGREB
We invite you to an international seminar on socially engaged museum practices, which opens a conversation on how the museum community – domestic and international – reacts to the genocide of the Palestinian people. How does it solidarize? In what way does solidarity and its boundaries resonate with broader local socio-political realities? Are museums subject to censorship and self-censorship? How do museum workers build and nurture long-term relationships with the activist community and the continuity of socially engaged practices?
Curators from Madrid, Ljubljana, Ramallah, and Zagreb will speak about these topics. The program is free of charge and open to the public, and no registration is required. The seminar will be held in English.
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 5–8 P.M.
PRESENTATIONS AND DISCUSSION
THE FIRST BLOCK FEATURES:
Ana Škegro (Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb)
Bojana Piškor (Modern Gallery, Ljubljana)
THE SECOND BLOCK FEATURES:
Maria Mallol González (Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid)
Rana Anani (writer and curator, Ramallah)
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 27, 10 A.M. – 1 P.M.
WORKSHOP
Led by: Maria Mallol González (Museo Reina Sofía, Madrid)
With the program closes GAZA REMAINS THE STORY of the Palestinian Museum in Ramallah. It is a travelling exhibition prepared so that it can be easily printed, curated and set up anywhere in the world – in any space that wants to stand in solidarity with the Palestinian people and to speak out against the genocide perpetrated against it by the State of Israel. Miscellaneous materials – from texts and drawings to photographs – bring us information and stories about the context in which the people of Gaza live and struggle to survive, but also create art. “While the deafening noise of incessant bombing destroys the everyday life, heritage, art, and creativity of the people of Palestine, this exhibition seeks to look behind the scenes of war and conquest,” the authors say.
BIOGRAPHIES OF THE SEMINAR PARTICIPANTS:
RANA ANANI is a curator and writer in the field of visual arts. She is a fellow at the Institute for Palestinian Studies (IPS) and the editor of its digital platform. She was in charge of communication at the Palestinian Museum, in 2018 she worked as the project manager of the Qalandiya International Biennial, the coordinator of the Palestinian Pavilion at the Cannes Film Festival and as the curator of Sharjah Biennale 13 off-site project‘Shifting Grounds’ in Ramallah. Anani is the author artist Sliman Mansour’s memoirs ‘’Darb El Ghoub’’, and the editor of artist Nabil Anani’s memoirs “Emerging to the Light”. She serves as a board member at the Khalil Sakakini Cultural Centre in Ramallah and is a fellow at the Alserkal Art Foundation.
MARIA MALLOL GONZÁLEZ is a cultural worker and a mother of two. She is part of the Tentacular Museum team, a department within the Study Directorship of the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid. The Tentacular Museum is rooted in the concept of Museo en Red (networked museum) and continues the experiments that the Reina Sofía Museum has been developing since 2008. Since 2023, they have operated under the ‘tentacular’ principle of Donna Haraway, understood as deregulated, multi-directional making-with, based on the with-touch practice – the practice of feeling realities and urgencies, cultivating long-term, meaningful connections. Through various activities, working groups and publications, the Tentacular Museum questions the co-responsible modalities of programming, sharing, and listening that create an ecosystem of alliances and exchanges around, within, and outside the Museum - a framework that goes beyond the sphere of art. The presentation will focus on how solidarity mechanisms can be activated together with this network of political and affective alliances built over the years, expanding on the 2024 solidarity with Palestine programs, organized as a call for the end of the war and the genocide, together with the TEJA Network of Cultural Spaces in Support of Emergency Situations, and with the support of L’Internationale, the European Confederation of Museums, Art Organizations, and Universities, founded in 2009.
BOJANA PIŠKUR is the curator of the Modern Gallery in Ljubljana. Her works mostly revolves around the Yugoslav and post-Jugoslav context and the Non-Aligned Movement, particularly in the context of art and culture. Furthermore, she is interested in how historical emancipatory ideas can be applied to the current realities.
ANA ŠKEGRO a curator, currently employed as the Head of the Experimental and Research Department and the Head of the Media Art Collection at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb (MSU). Since 2013, she has worked as an independent curator, producer, and organizer on various cultural and community projects. From 2017 to 2021, she was the curator of international projects and Head of the Education Department at the MSU. She has co-curated and organized numerous exhibitions and projects, such as the Visible Ones (2023-2025), The Smell of Freshly Chopped Wood (2024-2025), and Jan St. Werner: Vibraception (2024-2025), as well as the EU projects The Arts of Resistance (2024-2025), and the Museum of Commons (2023-2027).
ORGANIZED BY: BLOK
EXPERT ASSOCIATE: Tea Kantoci
EXHIBITION CURATORS: Maja Blažević, Tea Kantoci, Dunja Kučinac
TECHNICAL SUPPORT BY: Nikica Renić
DESIGN BY: EMA Vuković
THANK YOU TO: The Croatian School Museum
THE EXHIBITION AND SEMINAR ARE PART OF THE BLOK’S ‘MICROPOLITICS 2025’ PROJECT, WHICH IS FINANCIALLY SUPPORTED BY THE CITY OF ZAGREB. BLOK’S ANNUAL PROGRAM FOR 2025 IS SUPPORTED BY THE KULTURA NOVA FOUNDATION.
