Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza: Street Artists Unite for a Powerful Exhibition at La Nau, Valencia
This winter, Valencia becomes a site of artistic reckoning. La Nau Cultural Center presents Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza, a powerful exhibition curated by Spanish artist ESCIF and cultural producer Teresa Juan. Bringing together 15 international artists, the show spans installation, photography, painting, video, muralism, and public-space interventions. At its core stands a shared symbol: the olive tree, a living metaphor for endurance, rootedness, and regeneration amid destruction.
La Nau Cultural Center presents Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza, a powerful exhibition curated by Spanish artist ESCIF and cultural producer Teresa Juan.
The project reaffirms the University of Valencia’s commitment to defending human rights and illuminating the ongoing crisis in Gaza. Through twenty newly created and loaned works, the exhibition reflects on resistance, dignity, and the unyielding spirit of the Palestinian people.
La Nau Cultural Center presents Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza, a powerful exhibition curated by Spanish artist ESCIF and cultural producer Teresa Juan.
A Lineup of Influential Contemporary Artists
Participating artists include: Banksy (United Kingdom) collab with Escif, Shepard Fairey (United States), Emily Jacir (Palestine), Lamia Ziadé (Lebanon/France), Blu (Italy), Aruallan (France), Wilfredo Prieto (Cuba), Sam3 (Spain), Daniel Muñoz (Spain), and Valencian artists Fermín Jiménez Landa, David Segarra, and ESCIF himself.
La Nau Cultural Center presents Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza, a powerful exhibition curated by Spanish artist ESCIF and cultural producer Teresa Juan.
The exhibition also features work by Palestinian photojournalists Majdi Fathi, Saher Alghorra, and Haitham Imad, as well as collaborative contributions from the Palestinian Community of Valencia, BDS País Valencià, and the Delàs Centre for Peace Studies.
The exhibition also features work by Palestinian photojournalists Majdi Fathi, Saher Alghorra, and Haitham Imad
Together, these voices form a global chorus, weaving perspectives that span borders, disciplines, and lived realities.
La Nau Cultural Center presents Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza, a powerful exhibition curated by Spanish artist ESCIF and cultural producer Teresa Juan.
Exhibition Highlights
Blu’s New Video Installation
The Italian artist debuts a video piece created specifically for the exhibition, a poetic, unsettling reflection on conflict and persistence.
Blu’s New Video Installation
Lamia Ziadé’s Reimagined Border Mural
Ziadé recreates a mural she originally painted in 2016 on the wall between Lebanon and Israel, bringing its charged imagery into the gallery space.
Lamia Ziadé’s Reimagined Border Mural
Emily Jacir’s Monumental Canvas
A three-by-three-metre printed work, previously exhibited at the Venice Biennale and loaned by Simondi Gallery, serves as a commanding presence inside the Sala Acadèmia.
Emily Jacir’s Monumental Canvas
Shepard Fairey’s Public Intervention
Fairey’s large-scale illustration Can You Hear Us? (8 × 5.5 metres) is installed on La Nau’s north façade, facing Plaça del Patriarca, as part of the international Unmute Gaza campaign.
Shepard Fairey’s Public Intervention for ©Greenpeace/
ESCIF & Banksy: Beauty as Resistance
In a rare collaboration, ESCIF and Banksy present a fibreglass sculpture of an axe whose handle blooms into a flower—an elegant metaphor for defiance through beauty.
ESCIF & Banksy: Beauty as Resistance
Extending Beyond the Gallery
The exhibition continues into the cloister of La Nau, where the Palestinian Community of Valencia, working with ESCIF, has created painted panels expressing their collective voice. These first-person narratives shift the exhibition from representation to self-articulation.
The exhibition continues into the cloister of La Nau, where the Palestinian Community of Valencia, working with ESCIF
A set of photographs taken in the West Bank by Aruallan / Hans Lucas Agency offers additional documentary perspective. Partner organisations contribute written texts, freely available for visitors to take, encouraging the exhibition’s ideas to circulate far beyond the venue.
Rooted in Testimony
The main exhibition text is authored by journalist and documentary filmmaker David Segarra, whose experience aboard the 2010 Freedom Flotilla, attacked while transporting fifty journalists, resulting in ten deaths, forms a conceptual pillar of the project. His words anchor the exhibition in lived testimony and political urgency.
La Nau Cultural Center presents Olive Trees Are Born in Gaza, a powerful exhibition curated by Spanish artist ESCIF and cultural producer Teresa Juan.
Exhibition Information
Location: Sala Acadèmia, La Nau Cultural Center, University of Valencia
Dates: 10 December 2025, 7:30pm – 22 March 2026
Venue: La Nau Cultural Center, University of Valencia