THE GEERT WILDERS WORKS
(Rotterdam/The Hague, 2005)

Series of twenty-one installations, anonymously executed on four different days in April 2005. The installations comprised a collage of pictures of the politician Geert Wilders, stapled to trees, a framed picture of Wilders, one teddy bear, candles in glass cups, and white roses.

The project researched the meaning of the “public memorial,” a phenomenon representative for the Dutch Populist Movement. This series of works referred directly to the death of politician Pim Fortuyn. At the site of murder, in front of his house in Rotterdam, and in front of the Rotterdam city hall, enormous public memorials were installed, consisting of different paraphernalia. Thus, the phenomenon of the public memorial acquired its meaning as intimate expression of mourning and loss, as well as a celebration: a celebration of the popular, celebrity status obtained by politicians. This expressed itself through the far-reaching blurring between the representative of a certain political message and the message itself.

During the period in which the work was executed, Wilders reported to the two counts of threat. After the public announcement of the work the artist was immediately arrested and put in jail for two days, after which the Public Prosecutor decided to indict the artist. This led to the next two works: The Geert Wilders Work – A Trial I-II. The accusation was as follows: “threatening a member of Dutch parliament with death.”

Photo material from OPS-dossier # 2005137109 Police Archive Rotterdam Rijnmond, photographer unknown.