HeArt of Gaza at the Gonzaga Campus Palermo

Friday, January 30th, at 9:30 AM, the press presentation for the international traveling exhibition "HeArt of Gaza" will take place at the Gonzaga Campus Palermo, where it will remain open to the public until March 31st.

PALERMO - HeART of Gaza – Children's Art from the Heart of the Gaza Strip – is the international traveling exhibition that will be open to the public until March 31st.

The intent is to never grow weary of shattering indifference, moving beyond mere hearsay or superficial "truces" to forge deep emotional connections between those who dare not look and those who have lived through humanitarian tragedy firsthand, relying on art as a universal human language for healing, memory, and hope.

The exhibition presentation is scheduled for Friday, January 30th, at 9:30 AM, at the Casina Whitaker within the Gonzaga Campus. Members of the press are cordially invited to attend. This invitation is open to the entire city and is extended to civil and religious authorities, as well as teachers and school administrators across Palermo, so that the message may then reach the children and youth of our community. The exhibition will also be open to visitors during the Campus Open Day on Saturday, January 31st.

The name of the exhibition plays on the words "heart" and "art" to tell the story of a daily reality marked by war, loss, and fear—yet also by resilience and hope—through the eyes of children. The works are curated by Mohammed Timraz (Gaza, Palestine) and Féile Butler (Ireland). Hosted at the Gonzaga Campus, the exhibition has previously traveled to various European locations and other Italian cities, including Milan, Bologna, Lecco, and Bergamo.

“HeART of Gaza” was born in June 2024 from the collaboration between Mohammed Timraz, a young man from Gaza, and Irish illustrator Féile Butler. The project began as an exchange of drawings between children in Gaza and young artists in Ireland: a spontaneous, creative, and deeply human response to the dramatic conditions faced by children in the Gaza Strip, who have been severely affected by the conflict and worsening humanitarian crisis. In the city of Deir al-Balah, Timraz founded the “Artists’ Tent,” a creative space where children aged 3 to 17 could gather to draw and process their emotions through artistic expression. The core of the works on display in this exhibition originated from that very place.

HeART of Gaza aims to: restore dignity and a voice to children by offering them a space for creative expression that can also speak to adults; raise international awareness regarding the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip; and connect global communities and institutions to the reality of Gaza, fostering reflection on childhood, human rights, education, and peace through cultural initiatives at host venues. The project is the result of a collaboration among numerous cultural associations, local authorities, civic libraries, schools, and universities.

The leadership and faculty of the Campus, having had the opportunity to learn about and visit the exhibition, wanted to bring it to Palermo to a place of growth and education in order to share a message of humanity and hope from here. The exhibition at the Gonzaga Campus is curated by Professor Enrico Palumbo along with several young people. “This work is a perceptive and emotional diary,” states Professor Palumbo, “a unique testimony to the lives of the most upright people within a collapsing community and a landscape overwhelmed by war: an exploration of the radical dimensions of human existence: relationships, bonds, places, home, nature, shelter, threat, fear, destruction, and hope.” In the drawings of HeART of Gaza, the home is often wounded, destroyed, or in flames. These images pose an important question to us: “What kind of ‘home’—of world, relationships, and community—are we building together?” All the children in this exhibition have been displaced. Many of their homes have been destroyed. Two young artists, Reema and Hammad, were killed along with almost their entire family in a bombing on October 30, 2023.

“We want to invite all the young people of the city not to remain indifferent. In March, we will welcome a group of young Palestinians to our Campus. In particular, with Professor Aaron Allegra, we are organizing a twinning program with a school in the West Bank,” says Father Vitangelo Denora, Director General of the Gonzaga Campus. “These are young people who, despite everything, continue to go to school. It is a simple and powerful gesture of hope and of the future that we want to support by bringing students together with students. We must believe in the dreams of young people: many seek new paths, choosing dialogue instead of violence, still believing in good even when evil makes more noise. We want to walk alongside them with the language of education, care, shared humanity, and PEACE.”