The Taring Padi had made a massive 60-foot banner that was shown at an art display in Germany, called ‘Documenta.’ Politicians and some German newspapers saw the antisemitic images in the painting first.
The Documenta is considered an extremely important event, with 1,500 people coming to see the display of over 1,000 artists. This year has even more guests and artists, being curated by ruangrupa, an Indonesian art collective. The Documenta also has many other features to it, with a sauna and nightclub for visitors to freely talk about their own ideas or even social and political issues as well.
However, there has been a bit of controversy over a few of the artists and at least one piece of art. In January, a group called the Alliance Against Antisemitism Kassel had claimed that ruangrupad and a few other artists of supporting the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement against Israel.
Later on, a few politicians and German newspapers noticed that a painting that the Taring Padi, a collective of underground artists in Indonesia from 1998, had made showed some supposedly Jewish people with fangs, wearing a hat with the Nazi SS emblem patched on. This banner also had a military figure with a pig’s head, wearing a Star of David neckerchief with the word “Mossad”, name of Israel’s security service written on its helmet. This figure also appears with other soldiers that seem to be members of other intelligence forces, including the K.G.B.
Germany’s culture minister Claudia Roth said that she felt it was antisemitic imagery, with the banner being hated on by many other Jewish groups, including Israel’s embassy in Germany. Afterwards, Ms. Roth pressed that the festival needed to explain why the “clearly antisemitic picture” was even put up at all, adding that Documenta needed some reform in their system, if it wished to receive funding from Germany’s government in the future.
The Documenta is considered an extremely important event, with 1,500 people coming to see the display of over 1,000 artists. This year has even more guests and artists, being curated by ruangrupa, an Indonesian art collective. The Documenta also has many other features to it, with a sauna and nightclub for visitors to freely talk about their own ideas or even social and political issues as well.
However, there has been a bit of controversy over a few of the artists and at least one piece of art. In January, a group called the Alliance Against Antisemitism Kassel had claimed that ruangrupad and a few other artists of supporting the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement against Israel.
Later on, a few politicians and German newspapers noticed that a painting that the Taring Padi, a collective of underground artists in Indonesia from 1998, had made showed some supposedly Jewish people with fangs, wearing a hat with the Nazi SS emblem patched on. This banner also had a military figure with a pig’s head, wearing a Star of David neckerchief with the word “Mossad”, name of Israel’s security service written on its helmet. This figure also appears with other soldiers that seem to be members of other intelligence forces, including the K.G.B.
Germany’s culture minister Claudia Roth said that she felt it was antisemitic imagery, with the banner being hated on by many other Jewish groups, including Israel’s embassy in Germany. Afterwards, Ms. Roth pressed that the festival needed to explain why the “clearly antisemitic picture” was even put up at all, adding that Documenta needed some reform in their system, if it wished to receive funding from Germany’s government in the future.
