If Every Poster Was a Stone: Palestine Prints to Intervene, Disrupt, and Confront
Presented by EastSide Arts Alliance / Curated by Palestinian Youth Movement Bay Area and Thad Higa
Location: 2285 Gallery, 2285 International Blvd, Oakland, CA
Opening Reception: Saturday, June 28th, 2025 1-4pm
Exhibition Dates: June 28, 2025 — August 30, 2025
Gallery Hours: Thu-Sat, 12pm - 5pm
Oakland, CA: Eastside Arts Alliance in partnership with Palestinian Youth Movement Bay Area is excited to announce the opening of a new exhibition of posters in solidarity with the people of Palestine.
If Every Poster Was A Stone: Palestine Posters to Intervene, Disrupt, and Confront presents a local and international collection of Palestine posters which explore the use, responsibility, and inherent political nature of the poster.
Our theme references the First Intifada (1987-1993) also known as the Intifada of Stones, when Palestinians waged a widespread and steadfast revolution against the Zionist occupation. The practice of stone-throwing erupted across Palestine and was practiced by every sector of society. This popular form of resistance was reinforced through the mass distribution of posters and prints as a means of widespread communication. Success of the First Intifada is indicative of the role art plays in uniting the masses against systems of oppression and empowering them to resist until liberation. At the heart of our show is that very relationship between print, art, information and action.
If each poster is a stone, then each is both a weapon and a building block. En masse, they prove that a poster is not simply disparate slogans or motifs of a struggle, nor just the sum of its material parts. Rather, each one is a work of necessary hope and principled imagination. They understand that once you put art up in the world it either serves to enlighten and connect, or else it obscures and distracts from the injustices of our reality. This show honors Palestine prints that were created to interrupt mainstream imperialist media narratives, especially during globally sustained, rapid mobilization against the genocide in Gaza. Further, they span work that presents irresistible calls to action, clarifies truths that have been muddied and ignored by mass media, celebrates life, commemorates the interconnected international struggle for a free Palestine, and confronts pop culture's cynicism as well as Western media's complicity in promoting the genocidal status quo. Together, this is a testament to the role of art in movement building.
Please join us in reflecting on work gathered from the archives of the Palestine Poster Project and EastSide’s Community Archival Resource Project (CARP), from in person protests and actions led and organized by Palestinian Youth Movement Bay Area, Boycott Divest Sanction (BDS) campaigns like Mask off Maersk, to collective and art action groups like Dignidad Rebelde, Artists Against Apartheid, Justseeds Artists' Cooperative, and individual artists around the world, all creating work in solidarity for the people of Palestine.
Curators
EastSide Arts Alliance
EastSide Arts Alliance is an organization of Third World artists, cultural workers, and community organizers of color committed to working in the San Antonio and other Oakland neighborhoods to support a creative environment that improves the quality of life for our communities and advocates for progressive, systemic social change.
Community Archival Resource Project (CARP)
EastSide’s archive represents the past and current histories of Third World communities and social movements, focusing on the Bay Area 1960s–present. CARP serves as an active archival resource hub that informs local communities through lectures, readings, forums, exhibitions, film screenings, public art projects, and viewing appointments.
Palestinian Youth Movement Bay Area
The Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM) is an independent, grassroots movement of young Palestinians in exile worldwide as a result of the ongoing Zionist colonization and occupation of Palestine. We are dedicated to the freedom of our homeland and assume an active role as a youth in our national struggle for liberation.
Thad Higa
Thad Higa is a Korean-Okinawan American language worker. He works with artists' books, concrete poetry, printmaking, collage, typography, graphic design and living rooms. He investigates the intersections of language, technology, capitalism, white supremacy, and their roles in controlling perceptions of reality, value and legibility.
Financial Support
If Every Poster Was a Stone and all related public programs and events are made possible with generous funding from EastSide Arts Alliance, the Korean American Artist Collective and the Alternative Exposure 2025 Grant from Southern Exposure.
Korean American Artist Collective
The Korean American Artist Collective (KAAC) is a group of artists dedicated to supporting, building, and amplifying works that are politically, socially, and culturally engaged, and rooted in the Korean American experience. We do this by creating spaces of connection, collaborating, exhibiting, and distributing works in all media. Our work lies at the intersection of Korean American identity, community, and justice.
Our mission is to provide resources and opportunities for Korean American artists to collaborate and tell their stories, thereby presenting the Korean American experience in all of its complexity and diversity. We believe that building solidarity with and providing support for Korean American artists will bring about a more just and liberatory future.
Southern Exposure
Southern Exposure (SoEx) is an artist-centered nonprofit organization committed to supporting visual artists. Through our extensive and innovative programming, SoEx strives to experiment, collaborate and further educate while providing an extraordinary resource center and forum for Bay Area and national artists and youth in our Mission District space and off-site, in the public realm.
For exhibitions updates
For media contact: Roberto Martinez, roberto@eastsideartsalliance.org
