Nach der Wahl Louis Aliots zum Bürgermeister der südfranzösischen Stadt Perpignan im Juni 2020 treffen dessen Pläne zur Wiedereröffnung des nach Walter Benjamin benannten Zentrums für zeitgenössische Kunst auf vehementen Widerstand der französischen Öffentlichkeit, die darin eine Instrumentalisierung des Schicksals Walter Benjamins sehen. Aliot, Vizepräsident des rechtsnationalen »Rassemblement National« (RN) und ehemaliger Lebensgefährte von Marine Le Pen, beabsichtigt, die seit 2013 bestehende Kultureinrichtung in ein Dokumentationszentrum über Flucht und Vertreibung umzuwandeln.
Aus Anlass eines Offenen Briefs, den zahlreiche Intellektuelle und Kulturschaffende unterzeichnet haben, melden sich nun auch zwei der Enkelinnen Walter Benjamins zu Wort:
»Dear Madame Claus,
Please accept our apologies for the delay in getting in touch regarding the matter of Louis Aliot and his proposal to re-open the Centre d’Art Contemporain Walter Benjamin in Perpignan under his mayorship.
It has taken us some time to reply because, in all honesty, we are at a complete loss for words. To say that the thought of our grandfather’s name being used to promote the ideals and the ideas of the far right fills us with horror is an understatement.
Aliot and the Rassemblement National stand for everything that our grandfather, as well our grandmother, Dora Benjamin, and our father, Stefan, were against, emotionally, politically and intellectually.
The very notion that our family name might be used to celebrate, and propagate, the beliefs of the extreme right is an affront to our family’s history and to the collective history of all those who have fought, and who continue to fight, for a better world, for fairness and for the rights of all.
It sickens us. Please know that we stand with you in your protest against this proposal and if there is anything that we can do, any action that we can take, small or large, we would like to help. We must.
Our father would have been filled with anger and distress at these latest developments and would have fought to protect his father’s name from being used in this way.«
Website Prix Européen Walter Benjamin
Prix Européen Walter Benjamin