Tattoo shop owners seek new home after landlord's swastika mural 'ruined our business'

From JSOnline:

Claire Reid

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Owners of a Milwaukee tattoo shop say they are "looking around feverishly" and raising money for a new home for their business after the owner of its former building commissioned a pro-Palestinian mural, which features a swastika, on the outside wall.

Aaron Rodgers and Matt Stolzenburg ― the owners of Black Dawn Tattoo, formerly located at 424 E. Locust St. ― said that Ihsan Atta, the Palestinian-American landlord who owns the building at North Holton and East Locust streets, didn't inform them that the controversial mural would be going up.

The mural suggests that Jewish people are carrying out a new Holocaust and intertwines a Star of David and a swastika. It carries the words, "The irony of becoming what you once hated," in all capital letters. The mural has drawn criticism, especially from Milwaukee's Jewish community. Leaders of Jewish organizations have condemned it as antisemitic, ill-informed and threatening.

Atta said he put up the mural because he wanted to raise awareness about Israel's devastation in Gaza, which he considers to be genocidal and akin to the Holocaust. When he spoke to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel last week, he defended the image, arguing the swastika is "equivalent" to the Star of David because, he said, the star is used not only as a religious symbol, but a political symbol.

That comment also drew criticism from people who consider the intertwining of the Star of David and the swastika vile, espcially considering Jewish people were forced to wear identifiers such as armbands, or badges, in the shape of the Star of David under the Nazi regime.

Rodgers and Stolzenburg said the mural — and the vandalism and outrage it has attracted — have created an unsafe place to continue running their business. Rodgers said many of his employees quit because they were uncomfortable, and one employee said she was harassed on the first day the mural was up.

Black Dawn Tattoo has temporarily closed, and Rodgers and Stolzenburg have moved their business out of the building. Rodgers said employees plan to return if they can find a new location. So far, the owners haven't identified a place.

Last Friday, a woman used black paint to vandalize the mural, which was quickly restored. Then, late one recent night, Rodgers received a text alert from his security system that there was a "banging motion detected" at the tattoo shop. He said he rushed there to find two men hitting the mural with sledgehammers.

"What happens when someone wants to light it on fire?" Rodgers said.

Atta said he doesn't care that Black Dawn Tattoo moved out over the mural.

"There are people losing their lives in Palestine and in Gaza," he said. "So, if all I'm losing is tenants and money, I have no problem whatsoever. I'm willing to have an empty building, but I'm going to continue to express my freedom of speech and expression."

He said the artist who made the mural will reproduce it, but it will most likely be placed in a less accessible area. Atta plans to put up a new and different pro-Palestinian mural at the site of the controversy.

Black Dawn Tattoo set up a GoFundMe to raise money to help move the business to a new building. The GoFundMe page also says funds could go to "potential legal representation, and paying multiple lease agreements at the same time."

The fundraiser, which has a $12,000 goal, has raised nearly $4,400 as of Thursday afternoon. The Milwaukee Tattoo Festival pledged on social media to donate half of all festival ticket revenue through the end of September to help Black Dawn Tattoo with the unexpected expenses.

Black Dawn Tattoo says moving is not a 'political move'

Stolzenburg said some supporters of the mural have misunderstood the GoFundMe drive as a "political move." He said he and Rodgers simply want a safer space for their employees, clients and equipment.

"I don't know how people are angry at us about it, but ... those ones are the loudest ones, and it just sucks and it hurts," Stolzenburg said.

Rodgers said Black Dawn Tattoo has no ill will toward Atta, and that the mural is "well within his legal rights to do."

"But he still ruined our business by doing it," Rodgers said.

"I'm African-American, I don't want a swastika on the side of my building," he added. "I hate that a swastika (is on the building), especially in this climate where people are being threatened daily by white supremacist groups."

The pro-Palestinian mural replaced one of Breonna Taylor that was well-known to area residents. Taylor, a Black woman, was shot and killed in her home in 2020 by Louisville police during a botched raid. The police killings of Taylor and George Floyd in Minneapolis sparked nationwide protests about police violence.

Journal Sentinel reporter Sophie Carson contributed to this report.

From: https://www.jsonline.com/story/news/local/2024/09/20/milwaukee-tattoo-shop-moves-out-over-mural-put-up-by-building-owner/75290835007/?tbref=hp