Initial allegations In January 2022, five months before documenta fifteen opened, incorrect claims of ties to the
Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement were leveled against Documenta by the blog, Alliance Against Anti-Semitism Kassel, due to ruangrupa's inclusion of the
Palestinian art collective The Question of Funding. Despite factual inaccuracies in the blog post, major German and Israeli media outlets picked up on and circulated accusations of
antisemitism.
German law bars the use of
federal funds for groups with ties to the BDS movement, which is a global campaign calling for economic sanctions against Israeli goods and initiatives. The talks would have featured figures such as Israeli author
Omri Boehm; Marina Chernivsky, an anti-Semitism scholar and the German government’s commissioner for Jewish life; German curator
Anselm Franke; and Israeli-born architect
Eyal Weizman, founder of the group
Forensic Architecture.
Vandalism of exhibition venues In April 2022, multiple anti-Muslim stickers were found outside the ruruHaus exhibition venue. These stickers included slogans like “Freedom Not Islam!” "No Compromise with Barbarism!" and "Fight Islam Consistently!" Phrases spray-painted on walls included "187" and "PERALTA," the "187" an alleged reference to the
Penal Code of California for the crime of
murder, and "PERALTA" an alleged reference to Isabel Medina Peralta, the leader of a
Spanish far-right youth group who previously faced charges for inciting violence against Muslims. Documenta filed a criminal complaint with the city of Kassel following the vandalism, and artists and organizers involved with documenta fifteen issued a statement of support for ruangrupa. The statement claimed that the collective was erroneously accused of antisemitism.
Mural controversy Days after the 18 June 2022 opening of documenta fifteen, a mural titled ''People's Justice'' (2002) by the Indonesian artist group
Taring Padi came under intense controversy over what the German and Israeli governments condemned as antisemitic imagery, and the mural was subsequently covered up and taken down, sparking major political, artistic, and social debates in Germany. Originally collaboratively created in
Yogyakarta, Indonesia in 2002, the mural illustrates Indonesian politics as a battle of the people against oppressors, capitalists, and polluters. The mural is a critique of
Suharto's
military dictatorship and the complex power relationships that sustained it, with a section depicting the involvement of the government of
Israel through the use of
Jewish caricatures. Some of these figures have been identified as Jewish, Islamic, or American statesmen involved in colonial wars, support of the 1965 genocide and the occupation of
East Timor, acts of terrorism, or economic exploitation of Indonesia and
Irian, e.g.
Henry Kissinger. The artists and ruangrupa apologized for the use of
stereotype in the artwork, while denouncing antisemitism and discrimination in any form.
Claudia Roth, Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media, declared in an official statement that its removal was "overdue" and "is only a first step." He later stepped back from his position as chairman of the Documenta-Forum. , general director of the documenta fifteen, resigned on 17 July 2022 after initial resistance to stepping down. The controversy triggered a debate as to whether the Documenta itself should have a future. German President
Frank-Walter Steinmeier (SPD) said at the show's official opening, "there are limits” to what artists can do when they address political issues. He declared: “As justified as some criticism of Israeli policies, such as the building of settlements, is, recognizing Israeli statehood means recognizing the dignity and security of the modern Jewish community.” Steinmeier pointed out that the Documenta management should not "outsource their responsibility to the Indonesian curators", but instead should take on the role of mediators and “create appropriate structures" for debate. Federal Chancellor
Olaf Scholz (SPD) demonstratively announced that he would stay away from the Documenta this year. Art professor
Bazon Brock commented about the failure of the Documenta management during a radio interview hosted by the German public broadcaster
Deutschlandfunk: "People liquidated art in the name of artistic freedom." After the preliminary findings of the advisory panel argued that Documenta "allowed an
anti-Zionist, anti-Semitic and anti-Israeli mood to prevail," an open letter titled "We are angry, we are sad, we are tired, we are united," was published on 10 September 2022, co-signed by ruangrupa and 65 participating artists from documenta fifteen. The letter highlighted the continued harassment and discrimination faced by ruangrupa and documenta fifteen artists, arguing that the methods and claims of the advisory panel were
pseudoscientific, racist, and
Eurocentric, "a way of projecting onto and transposing
German guilt and history into the Palestinian and other
anti-colonial struggles." ruangrupa asserted that documenta fifteen featured many artists involved in
grassroots movements who have struggled with and are still struggling with colonial regimes, with the Palestinian anti-colonial struggle emerging as a topic in many artworks because of the historical solidarities between anti-colonial struggles across the world. == After documenta fifteen ==