People’s Justice: Difference between revisions

|description_of_content=“People’s Justice” is an agitprop tableau collaboratively designed and produced by the artists’ collective, Taring Padi in 2002. The large (8 by 12-meter / 26 by 39-foot), colorful work was created to commemorate victims of Indonesia’s dictatorship under General Suharto, which lasted from 1967 through 1998. It contains layers of chaotic scenes depicting multiple figures in tension and in conflict: laborers and business people, victims of violence and starvation, armed government agents/soldiers, humanoid-animals, and symbols of death. Many of the figures are depicted in exaggerated, satirical styles.One of the caricatures depicted seems to be a member of the Mossad, Israel’s secret service, depicted as a pig. Another seemingly Jewish figure appears with fangs, blood-red eyes, a large nose, pointy teeth, side-locks, and a cap emblazoned with “SS,” the acronym for the Nazi ''Schutzstaffel''.

|description_of_incident=Taring Padi was invited by the collective ruangrupa to participate in Documenta 15, a biennial exhibition of contemporary art hosted by Museum Fridericianum in Kassel, Germany, which takes place every five years. Ruangrupa, an Indonesian arts collective, curated Documenta 15, inviting 67 other core participants mainly from the Global South.Taring Padi’s image, with its illustrations of various Jewish figures presented in stereotypically antisemetic ways, generated immediate and considerable controversy. By the end of the day upon which the controversy erupted, the artwork was covered up.