Art has long crossed borders that remain closed to people. In moments of restriction and displacement, images have carried memory, solidarity and political presence beyond imposed limits.

Within Palestinian culture, that movement has taken many forms. Posters, prints, journals and exhibition catalogs preserved histories of exile and collective life. Among these publications was Shu'un Filastiniyya (Palestinian Affairs), an intellectual and cultural journal published by the PLO's Palestine Research Center whose covers featured work by Palestinian and international artists. These printed materials circulated through refugee camps, universities, demonstrations, exhibitions and solidarity networks, often far from where they were made. In doing so, they created a visual account at a time when that history was being defined by others.

After the Nakba of 1948, artists increasingly addressed displacement, connection to the land and return through visual art.  Images of refugees, villages, families, workers and the landscape represented Palestinian life from within. By the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, print had become a central medium. Posters were affordable, reproducible and suited to public display.  Shared widely, they connected Palestine with broader movements against colonialism and occupation.

Invitation card for the International Art Exhibition for Palestine, Beirut, 1978, featuring Palestinian Geometry by Mohammed Chabâa. Source: Mona Saudi.

The 1978 International Art Exhibition for Palestine became one of the clearest expressions of that exchange. Organized by the Plastic Arts Section of the PLO’s Office of Unified Information, it brought together approximately 200 works donated by artists from nearly 30 countries as the intended nucleus of a future Museum of Solidarity with Palestine. The exhibition made visible an international network aligned with the Palestinian cause and showed its place within a wider history of liberation movements. During the 1982 Israeli siege of Beirut, the building where the collection and its archives were stored was destroyed by shelling. Much of the collection was subsequently lost. The catalogs, photographs and documents that survived became evidence of both the exhibition and the network behind it, underscoring the fragility of cultural records.

This history is part of cultural resistance: protecting memory, maintaining authorship and keeping the past visible. September Native draws from this tradition. By adapting printed images for clothing, the project places them within everyday life, where they can introduce someone to an artist, an archive or a part of Palestinian history that might otherwise remain unknown.