French artist, Combo, beaten after drawing ‘Coexist’
A French graffiti street artist named Combo was attacked by a gang after refusing to take down a mural calling for religious harmony in Paris using religious symbols to spell out “Coexist.”
Combo, 28, is also known as Culture Kidnapper, was left with a dislocated shoulder and bruises across his face after being attacked in a ghetto in the east of the capital. The man tweeted a photo of his face as he told the story on Facebook.
Combo, beaten and battered photo/ Twitter
“They were tired that I wasn’t giving, so they left me bleeding and fled,” he wrote. “They promised me the same treatment if I did it again and told me to shave off my beard.”
He declined to discuss the identity of his attackers, saying “it would only add fuel to the fire”, adding: “I won’t forgive them for what they did of course, but I won’t seek revenge either…I filed a complaint with the police and I trust the French judicial system to do its job.”
He had just finished a design that featured the word ‘Coexist’ written with a Muslim crescent as the letter “C,” a Star of David as the letter “X,” and a Christian cross as a “T.” It was accompanied by a life-size self-portrait and his tag ‘combo’. More details as La Monde – here
The attack has highlighted the religious tensions in the French capital that have flared up since last month’s massacre at the Charlie Hebdo newspaper by Islamist extremists.
Even Combo admits how different things are: “It is different, clearly. The way people look at me especially. Not because of my origins I believe, but because of my beard. That being said, I’m not being paranoid and I’m very confident about the future. I’m forbidding myself to be pessimistic. The atmosphere is heavier than usual, but I only see it as temporary thing. It doesn’t drastically change the way I work. We always had racism issues in France, especially towards Arabs. And the perception one may have, particularly from abroad, is clearly something that is fuelled by the media…”
