Wing Luke Staff Ends Walkout, Museum Plans to Move Forward With Exhibit That Sparked Protest

by Nimra Ahmad

The Wing Luke Museum remained closed this week although workers ended their walkout last week in protest of Zionist language in a new exhibit, which the museum plans to relaunch June 30 after making additions to it.

The exhibit, "Confronting Hate Together," was a joint creation of the Wing Luke Museum, the Black Heritage Society of Washington State, and the Washington State Jewish Historical Society.

"The goal, when we began planning in early 2023, was to build an exhibit focused on the activism and responses to hate and discrimination taken by three communities, which historically overlap and intersect in their experiences living within the highly discriminatory Redline boundary of Seattle," read a joint statement from the three groups released May 30.

The 26 staff who walked out on May 22 said that a text panel from the exhibit "conflate[s] anti-Zionism as antisemitism." They withheld labor for seven days until their four demands were met, including removing Zionist language from Wing Luke publications, acknowledging the limited perspectives in the exhibit, requiring community advisory committees to review all exhibits, and centering voices that align with the museum's mission through an anti-white supremacist framework.

In an Instagram post, the Wing Luke staff wrote that "the actual work needed to meet the original demands will be done through smaller committees with staff participation." They wrote that they're awaiting a timeline from leadership on next steps and will continue to center Palestinian liberation.

On Tuesday, June 11, the Wing Luke Museum website posted a banner that said it remains temporarily closed.

"When we do eventually reopen, there will be additions made to the panel and/or the exhibit," said Steve McLean, Wing Luke Museum's director of communications. The original text panel read that "antisemitism is often disguised as anti-Zionism," and listed different examples of what it noted as antisemitism.

McLean said the choice to remain closed has to do with ensuring that staff and leadership are able to continue having conversations about the concerns and demands of the staff who walked out, and also with safety concerns after the national attention the museum and its staff received following the protest.

"There's a lot of concern and controversy around the exhibit," McLean said. "[The staff wants] to feel that they're safe to come back … There's a community outside that has had a diversity of opinions, and we're just making sure that [the staff feels] comfortable … We have to make sure that we're prepared to be open and prepared to address any of the myriad concerns that staff and management realize we have to deal with."

In its May 31 pop-up statement on its website, Wing Luke emphasized its goal of reopening the museum and "getting back to work."

"We intended 'Confronting Hate Together' … to inspire community conversations," the statement read. "Recent events, however, have unintentionally brought fraught conversations to our Museum. Our imperative now is to get back to serving our beloved communities, and our focus is to open the Museum as soon as possible."

The Washington State Jewish Historical Society also supported the reopening of Wing Luke, writing on May 24, "At a time when education on the danger of anti-Jewish, anti-Black, and anti-Asian hate have never been more relevant, this exhibit is more important than ever."

This article is published under a Seattle Human Services Department grant, "Resilience Amidst Hate," in response to anti-Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander violence.

📸 Featured Image: Wing Luke Museum workers continued their pro-Palestine walkout to protest language in an exhibit equating anti-Zionism to antisemitism. (Photo courtesy of Wing Luke Museum workers)