More than twenty years have passed since the end of the New Order regime, but artistic freedom remains a complex issue in Indonesia. It is closely related to the overall failure to promote the fulfillment of human rights, which is only getting worse in recent years.

In a country that neglects human rights, artistic freedom, as one of the indicators of human rights fulfillment, has surely been overlooked. There is a lack of discussion around artistic freedom in Indonesia, while in contrast, there have been quite many cases of violation being reported and covered by the media. Furthermore, the cases of artistic freedom violation are not consistently reported or covered given there is only a small audience for the issue.

In 2020, Koalisi Seni with support from UNESCO through the Korea Funds-In-Trust scheme, performed a literature study on cases of artistic freedom violation between 2010 and 2020. The study found that the spirit of reformasi (reform era) has instead given rise to identity politics, which is often used by the government as an instrument to control the public.

The findings were made public at “Rupa Kebebasan Berkesenian di Indonesia (State of Artistic Freedom in Indonesia)” webinar on November 10, 2020. The English version of the literature study can be downloaded on this page, and click on this link to download the presentation (in Bahasa Indonesia) of the artistic freedom webinar.

At the webinar, Koalisi Seni found that the National Commission on Human Rights had developed a draft of Norm Standards and Regulations (Standar Norma dan Pengaturan [SNP]) on Rights to Freedom of Opinion and Expression and allowed the public to give feedback on it. On November 23, 2020, Koalisi Seni gave feedback on the artistic freedom part of the SNP. The feedback (in Bahasa Indonesia) can be downloaded here.