Camilio

War Can Be Avoided!
If We Want It.

Reflections from the Neue Nationalgalerie, Berlin

Recently, I took part in the Dream Together exhibition by Yoko Ono at the Neue Nationalgalerie in Berlin. My contribution was a performance piece, quiet, deliberate, and stitched with intention. Inspired by Ono’s iconic collaboration with John Lennon, War is Over! (If You Want It), my work aimed to echo and extend their message into the present moment.

But standing there, in that space of art and reflection, I couldn’t help but ask myself: Has (any) war ever truly been over?

I doubt it.

Perhaps it depends on where you were born. Or where you happen to live. For as long as I can remember, conflict, war (and often also genocides) has always existed, not on my doorstep, always somewhere else. But I see the world as my home, our home, so, living peacefully is location boud, and I was happy born into safety, peace and richdom.
 
With: War is over! Ono and Lennon were responding to the Vietnam War at the time. Today, our attention is drawn to Ukraine, to the genocide in Gaza. But what about Sudan, Syria, Armenia, Azerbaijan, West Papua, Congo, etc....? So many wars don’t make the headlines (or onlu sort). So many lives affected in silence. So many stories erased from our collective memory as attention shifts elsewhere.

For my performance, I wore a jacket – one I had embroidered with a message both simple and urgent:

War can be avoided!
if we want it.

Inspired by Yoko&John

Happy spring 2025

It’s not just a slogan. It’s a challenge.

I wore it as a statement of belief, belief in the collective, in our shared potential. Because change doesn’t come from above. Not really. It begins with people (for sure in democarcies.....), with communities, with citizens who choose to care. We vote. We speak. We pay attention. Or we look away. In democracies, our responsibility doesn’t trickle down from power; it rises from the ground up. And every decision, where we focus, how we respond, whether we care about the suffering of people we may never meet, matters.

The Dream Together exhibition puts a spotlight on Yoko Ono’s solo career, and rightly so. She is so much more than the tired myth of “the woman who broke up the Beatles.” Her body of work is rich, political, poetic, and deserving of every bit of recognition. Yoko had already a great creer before meeting John Lennon. 

Still, as I walked through the exhibition, I found myself thinking about Imagine. As beautiful and hopeful as that song is, there’s something about it that feels too passive now. Too abstract. A dream with its eyes closed. So, the titel 'Lets dream together' gave me that same feeling. A bit lazy, to free, to easy.....

And dreams are vital, yes. But waking up, and take action, matters more.

In a world where figures like Wilders, Putin, and Trump increasingly dominate headlines and shape public discourse, dreaming isn't enough. We must stay alert. Informed. Engaged. We must be willing not only to dream together, but to act together againts. Act together against lies, stop margenalising groups, stop racism, etc. To build solidarity across borders and systems. To resist the seductive pull of individualism and reclaim community as a force for resistance.

Because war is not over.

In fact, it feels like we are inching closer to yet another large-scale conflict, while countless others continue out of sight. Often, it's not the absence of peace we struggle with, but the absence of attention.

And yet – I still believe war can be avoided.
If we really want it.

The question is: Do we?