Conceived by Yael Bartana, Bury Our Weapons, Not Our Bodies! is a public performance challenging systems of violence and displacement through a symbolic burial and a call to action. Forming a “living monument” to the end of violence, this performance includes a public procession, a burial of weapons (both literal and metaphorical), and a series of eulogies about war, peace, and democracy. Bringing together funerary tradition, military ritual, and personal testimony, Bury Our Weapons, Not Our Bodies! deepens the artist’s investigations of memory and national identity.
A series of masks designed for the performance are in the center of the visual identity. They show human faces, but also grotesque masks, in the form of a shield. The starting point of the design was the appearance of the gas mask—a tool of protection and then it expanded into different forms. The masks are suggesting neo-tribalism movements while referencing the abstract masks created by the Bauhaus and Dada movements.
🍒 Collaboration with Gila Kaplan
