Pint-sized, plastic and the height of kitsch they may be, but no one in Germany would usually think twice about seeing a garden gnome, given there are 25 million of them across the country.
But the 1,250 that appeared on a square in a Bavarian town has caused an outcry, not least because they are giving a Nazi salute.
The artist Ottmar Horl placed the gnomes in the town of Straubing, close to Munich, in an installation called Dance With the Devil. It follows controversy sparked by a single, golden Hitler-saluting gnome crafted by Horl that prosecutors tried to remove from an art gallery in the summer on the grounds that Nazi symbols were prohibited in public.
PHOTO: AFP
They later dropped the case, recognizing that the piece was satirical, and the artist has since seen a run on requests for his creations.
Horl, 59, who has made other mass reproductions, including a group of praying dwarfs made in the image of Pope Benedict that provoked a similar row, said his gnomes were meant to highlight the rise of fascism in Germany and were a “historical social gesture.”
“I want to show that there is far-right thought in the heads of all of us,” he said.
Gnomes were a particularly fitting method for conveying his message “in a lighter and unpatronizing way, at the same time as being strong enough to provoke a reaction. As long as I manage to polarize, I’m on the right track.”
Horl’s gnomes, which went on display on Wednesday for five days, were financed by the local wing of the Social Democratic party after the town’s cultural committee twice refused to do so.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in