Culture

Resistance: Kurdish artist Zehra Dogan’s latest artwork depicts Rojava injustice

Kurdish artist Zehra Dogan’s latest work of art is a street mural that depicts the Kurdish people’s ongoing struggle for self-determination.

Kurdistan 24 2019/10/20 11:12

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ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Kurdish artist Zehra Dogan’s latest work of art is a street mural that depicts the Kurdish people’s ongoing struggle for self-determination amid Turkey’s military offensive in northern Syria.

The street painting, called “Berxwedan (Resistance),” was completed on Friday in London, the United Kingdom.

The work shows about a dozen Kurdish women, young and old, standing in front of a tank, presumably belonging to the Turkish army. With fists raised to the air, the women in the painting hold their ground against the attack.

Above the image are the words: “Resistance is Life!”

'Berxwedan' pic.twitter.com/KJPXxf9Xnj
— Zehra Doğan (@zehradoganjinha) October 20, 2019

The Turkish incursion in northern Syria began on Oct. 9. The offensive has left at least 235 people dead and displaced over 300,000 others, according to Syrian Kurdish officials.

A controversial 120-hour US-brokered ceasefire, which began on Friday, has temporarily paused heavy clashes.

In February, Dogan was released from a Turkish prison after serving almost 20 months in jail for a painting the Turkish government deemed “terrorist propaganda.”

She was sentenced to two years, nine months, and 22 days on March 24, 2017, over a painting depicting the destruction in the town of Nusaybin in the Kurdish province of Mardin in Turkey, which remained under an on-and-off curfew for months in 2016.

Turkish soldiers and army vehicles seen in front of a destroyed neighborhood where they hung Turkish flags on demolished houses, 2016. (Photo: Social media)

Dogan's depiction based on a photograph of destruction in the Kurdish town of Nusaybin. (Photo: Zehra Dogan)

The courts deemed the artwork as “terrorist propaganda” for the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), whose fighters lead a guerrilla warfare against Ankara.

“They asked me, ‘Why did you depict the Turkish flag on these destroyed buildings?’ and sentenced me to two years and 10 months. Whereas, they are the ones who took the photograph. I only painted it,” Dogan tweeted after the court ruling.