Stop the violence against humanity

Language accessibility: English
Free entry

The legendary Indonesian art collective Taring Padi, founded in 1998 by art students and activists in Yogyakarta, will hold a two-day workshop of making life-size cardboard puppets, known as wayang kardus in Indonesian, which are used at protests and demonstrations. For almost thirty years, the group has been supporting people around the world in their struggles for social justice. Large painted banners, woodcut-print posters, music, murals, exhibitions, parades, and cardboard puppets have been a key part of Taring Padi’s artistic work, which they see as a tool to “educate, agitate, and organize.” When used in street protests, the puppets make crowds look larger, provide shade from the sun, and offer some protection from police.

The theme of the workshop is “Stop the violence against humanity,” and it follows Taring Padi’s print and publishing project 6065. The year 2026 marks sixty years since the Indonesian genocide of 1965–66. After a failed coup attempt, Indonesia’s military—with help and lists of names provided by the United States government—began targeting left-wing political groups. Over the next few years, nearly two million people were killed and hundreds of thousands were imprisoned without trial.

Sixty years after the killings, Taring Padi is raising a timely question—“What happens to the future when the fascists win?”—and simultaneously trying to imagine a world where justice is finally achieved. The workshop reminds us that history is an important lesson for everyone about how far powerful groups will go to stop movements that fight for a better world. The message of the workshop tells us that it is up to us to learn from history to prevent such crimes from happening again.

Throughout the two days of the workshop, Taring Padi will facilitate a group discussion to locally contextualize the theme and walk participants through the process of collectively deciding on the narrative and political message for their puppet characters. The results of the workshop will become part of the biennale exhibition in the Great Hall of the National Gallery, and later the puppets will return to those who created them to serve as tools in street protests and direct action.

Taring Padi was founded in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, in 1998 by a group of artists and activists involved in the sociopolitical uprising against the corrupt and violent dictatorship of Haji Mohammad Soeharto, known as Suharto. Taring Padi’s mission is to use art as a tool of political unrest, solidarity, and education in order to effect social and democratic change, working in solidarity with community groups on environmental and social justice issues. Its practice is characterized by the collective creation of wayang kardus, murals, banners, sculptures, and street theater actions.