{"id":474783,"date":"2026-05-08T12:57:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T12:57:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/474783\/"},"modified":"2026-05-08T12:57:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T12:57:11","slug":"israels-artists-face-isolation-at-venice-biennale-and-prepare-for-booing-at-eurovision-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/474783\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel\u2019s artists face isolation at Venice Biennale and prepare for booing at Eurovision \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Israeli<\/a> Eurovision<\/a> entrant Noam Bettan has begun last-minute rehearsals for this year\u2019s song contest in Vienna by having his team boo at him. Amid ongoing tensions over Israel\u2019s participation, and a boycott of countries including Ireland, the 28-year-old is rehearsing his song, Michelle, in an unnamed secure location.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn rehearsals I have a team that always makes sure to boo me to make it difficult for me, that really helps a lot,\u201d Bettan told Germany\u2019s Bild tabloid ahead of next week\u2019s contest. \u201cI am just trying to concentrate on the rehearsals and my performance on the stage \u2013 and to enjoy it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bettan said he had learned from last year\u2019s Israeli entrant, Yuval Raphael, who was booed during her performance. His training has physical and mental components, he told Bild, from squats and jumping jacks to a pre-performance meditation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI always say the Shema Israel prayer,\u201d he said. \u201cIt may sound like a cliche but God is with me, I feel it really and that gives me strength. I feel how he leads me on the path I\u2019ve been going down for many years.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow everything will lead to this amazing moment,\u201d he added, \u201con the largest stage in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some 600km (372.8 miles) away at the Venice Biennale, the largest art platform in the world opens officially on Saturday. There, Israel\u2019s artistic representative Belu-Simion Fainaru says he has been widely shunned by other artists.<\/p>\n

A native of Bucharest, Fainaru\u2019s work, Rose of Nothingness, is on show at the Arsenale while the official Israeli pavilion is undergoing renovations.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am talking to no one and am completely isolated. That hurts. Particularly as I am surrounded by people working for other pavilions,\u201d he told Die Welt daily. \u201cI believe in dialogue, and am used to it from earlier exhibitions, but whomever I turned to here to greet, they turn away from me. I have had interaction with not a single artist or curator at the Biennale.\u201d<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s Biennale has been gripped by controversy over the participation of Israel and Russia. On March 13th, 74 artists and curators from the main exhibition sent a letter to the director Pietrangelo Buttafuoco calling for the exclusion of those two countries and the United States, writing: \u201cThere is a threshold beyond which participation in La Biennale should not be normalised.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fainaru, a sculptor and installation artist who moved to Israel as a teenager, said his Venice shunning reminded him of the 1940s, \u201cwhen people like me were threatened, and everyone went along with it\u201d.<\/p>\n

Ahead of the official opening, the prize jury resigned in protest at the inclusion of Russia and Israel, prompting organisers to announce prizes will be awarded by public vote. <\/p>\n

Unlike Eurovision, Ireland is not boycotting the Biennale and is represented by five artists.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0The Irish artists at Venice Biennale 2026Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Israeli Eurovision entrant Noam Bettan has begun last-minute rehearsals for this year\u2019s song contest in Vienna by having…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":474784,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75],"tags":[18,117,10893,6621,19,17,71,371,12876],"class_list":{"0":"post-474783","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-eire","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-eurovision","11":"tag-germany","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-israel","15":"tag-italy","16":"tag-venice"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116539074013210542","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474783","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=474783"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/474783\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/474784"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=474783"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=474783"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=474783"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}