dpa/epd/taz | The Düsseldorf sculptor and carnival float builder Jacques Tilly is unimpressed by the fact that he is currently away The trial in Moscow for alleged denigration of the Russian state organs is made. He does his job as always. “Neither do I follow the motto ‘Now more than ever’, nor do I become particularly meek out of respect for the attack,” Tilly told the “Web.de News” portal in an interview published on Tuesday.
In recent years, Tilly had repeatedly built carnival floats for the Düsseldorf Rose Monday procession with caricatures of Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin. Last year he had a motif with the inscription “Hitler-Stalin Pact 2.0” displayed. Putin and American President Donald Trump shake hands and crush Ukrainian head of state Volodymyr Zelensky.
Previously, Tilly had presented a car showing Putin taking a bloodbath in a bathtub that had the colors of Ukraine. The sculptor brought one of his works – a figure of Putin in handcuffs – to the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
According to the court, Tilly must answer for, among other things, defamation of the Russian state organs, including the Russian army and Putin. Following such accusations, many opponents of the invasion of Ukraine ordered by Putin have already been convicted in Russia. The decisions have been criticized internationally as unfair judgments by the Russian arbitrary justice system.
“Humor is a very humane weapon”
Tilly, who says he never received any official information from Russia about the procedure, initially believed it was false information. “I simply couldn’t imagine that even an authoritarian state like Russia is so unsovereign that it would react to satire and humor in this way,” he told the portal.
He built these cars, “I can’t undo that, and I don’t want to,” said Tilly. If this was what the consequences of fools’ freedom looked like, then he would have to accept it. The trial confirms that satire also and above all hurts autocratic rulers. “But humor is a very humane weapon. It doesn’t hurt physically, and it doesn’t kill either,” said the 62-year-old Düsseldorf artist.
He called fear a bad advisor given the process. “But I have to do a risk assessment when I travel. Some countries are no longer going, India, Serbia, Indonesia: all the countries that have an extradition agreement with Russia,” said Tilly. But Italy is the most beautiful anyway.
Tilly is above all known for his bitingly satirical theme floats in the Düsseldorf carnival. Since 1984 he has been building and designing carnival floats, which have caused a stir around the world on several occasions. Every year his carnival floats are therefore awaited with particular excitement. In the interview, Tilly did not comment on the motives for this year’s Rose Monday procession on February 16th: “We won’t reveal that. We have strict secrecy in Düsseldorf.”