Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette and Frédérique Bérubé join their voices with those of several artists from the Montreal scene to demand a ceasefire on Gaza via a poignant video launched on the Facebook page Artists for a ceasefire Thursday morning.
In this powerful video, we can see several artists showing solidarity with the Palestinian people: Maxime Le Flaguais, Ines Talbi, Vincent Leclerc, Caroline Dhavernas, etc.
“I have very good friends who lost their entire family in this conflict,” says Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette. Every day I receive texts from my friend in the West Bank, whose family has been decimated. She’s a girl like me, she’s my boyfriend, I lived with her… It’s impossible for me to stay here and do nothing.”
“I don’t have to think about it too much because it upsets me deeply,” she whispers. Being in action is always the best way to avoid falling into despair.”
Show your support
With this video, author and filmmaker Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette and director Frédérique Bérubé, both members of Mères au front, respond to a request from Palestinian women in Quebec.
“I am connected to the community, because I lived and studied in Palestine,” explains Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette. I went to university there, I learned the language. I directed the film Insh’Allah, which takes place in Palestinian territory… Here, I met Palestinian women, especially women, who asked me: “Why is the artistic community so silent? What are you afraid of?”
“The artists, we really felt useless in the face of this conflict,” adds Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette. It’s not as if we said to ourselves that it would be useful if we supported a ceasefire. On the contrary, we heard “We need to hear your voices for support. The power you have is that your voices carry more than many others.”
The invitation was therefore extended to several artists for the creation of the capsule, which was shot in just one day in Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette’s apartment. “If I had stretched the shoot over a week, I would have had thousands of artists coming to my house!”
Counteract impotence
The objective of this video is clear: to make voices resonate to reach as many ears as possible. “It’s an invitation to speak out and take this little power we have to stop this war, the deaths of which can no longer be counted. The more the video is shared, the more people will be able to be active.
In addition to petitions from Oxfam and Amnesty International Canada, Artists for Cease Fire shares with the video a link to write a letter to your MP.
Here are the signatories of this ceasefire request: Anaïs Barbeau-Lavalette, Frédérique Bérubé, Larissa Corriveau, Kelly Depeault, Dominic Champagne, Caroline Dhavernas, Monique Simard, Maxime Le Flaguais, Vincent Leclerc, Florence Longpré, Ines Talbi, Nicolas Basque (Plants and Animals), Daniel Brière, Evelyne de la Chenelière, Christine Beaulieu, Éléonore Loiselle, Antoine Nicolas, Marya Zarif, Samer Najari, Zahia El-Masri, Nadine Jaafar, Anne Thériault, Louis Bouvier, Geneviève Albert, Adèle Rivard ( Bibi Club), Fabienne Presentey, Mattis Savard, Madeleine Saar, Marie-Joanne Boucher and Halima Ouardiri.
Artists for Cease Fire intends to continue its actions, in particular by sharing personal testimonies from artists in relation to the conflict on social networks.