REMEMBER THE GRAFFITI on the walls of the refugee camp in this week’s episode of Homeland?
In all likelihood, you don’t: graffiti in the background of a TV drama isn’t the sort of thing viewers are supposed to notice, particularly.
The artwork is the talk of social media today, however.
Why?
Apparently the people hired to paint it used the opportunity to write messages criticising the show’s alleged stereotypes of Muslims.
“Homeland is racist,” one of the slogans reads.
Another says “Homeland is rubbish”.
After that, the messages get a little more playful. For instance: “Homeland is a joke, and it didn’t make us laugh”.
The artists say they were contacted by another street artist at the start of June.
“He had been contacted by Homeland’s set production company who were looking for ‘Arabian street artists’ to lend graffiti authenticity to a film set of a Syrian refugee camp on the Lebanese/Syrian border for their new season.
“Given the series’ reputation we were not easily convinced, until we considered what a moment of intervention could relay about our own and many others’ political discontent with the series. It was our moment to make our point by subverting the message using the show itself.”
Producers didn’t check the messages before the show was aired.
While Showtime, which produces the drama, hasn’t responded to the story as yet, Homeland showrunner Alex Gansa told Deadline they wished they’d “caught these images before they made it to air”.
“However, as Homeland always strives to be subversive in its own right and a stimulus for conversation, we can’t help but admire this act of artistic sabotage.”
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