{"id":728894,"date":"2026-01-29T16:08:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T16:08:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/728894\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T16:08:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T16:08:13","slug":"trial-against-german-carnival-satirist-underway-in-russia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/728894\/","title":{"rendered":"Trial against German carnival satirist underway in Russia"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russian<\/a> President Vladimir Putin<\/a> bathes in the blood of Ukraine<\/a>, while US President Donald Trump<\/a> tears up the climate protection agreement like an angry child: These Dusseldorf carnival floats made by German artist and float builder Jacques Tilly are meant to provoke<\/a>. They’ve now\u00a0also provoked the Russian state, which has taken him to court \u2014 a first for the famed artist.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A trial against Tilly is now underway in Moscow. It was scheduled to continue this past Wednesday in the defendant’s absence, but after a brief opening session, it was postponed for the second time until February 26.<\/p>\n

\"AMove over, Vladimir: Putin isn’t the only politician Tilly satirizes, as this float of Donald Trump from 2025 showsImage: Karl F. Sch\u00f6fmann\/imagebroker\/IMAGO<\/p>\n

At earlier hearings in December, the court-appointed defense attorney arrived late; this time, prosecution witnesses failed to appear. Representatives of the German Embassy are expected to attend the upcoming hearings in Moscow, but they will not have the right to speak.<\/p>\n

“With everything that is happening in the world right now, I find\u00a0it downright ridiculous that a carnival float builder, of all people, is being put on trial. It’s like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut,” Tilly said in an interview with Deutsche Welle.<\/p>\n

\"AThe Dusseldorf-based Jacques Tilly is famous in Germany for his satirical Carnival floatsImage: Horst Ossinger\/dpa\/picture alliance<\/p>\n

Tilly’s oversized figures ride on the carnival<\/a> floats of Dusseldorf’s Rose Monday parades, which take place the Monday before Ash Wednesday,\u00a0and have become world famous. Whether it’s the church or the state, climate catastrophe or right-wing extremists, Tilly doesn’t shy away from any topic.<\/p>\n

“There were many threats of legal action, including last year when I built a float featuringAlice Weidel<\/a>, the chairwoman of the Alternative for Germany<\/a>\u00a0[a partially right-wing extremist party: Eds.], in a witch’s house. She holds a gingerbread swastika under the noses of young voters. There were 20 threats of legal action, but no charges were brought.”<\/p>\n

\"AA threat to sue Tilly for this AfD-spoofing float in 2025 was never realizedImage: Hesham Elsherif\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

What does the charge mean?<\/p>\n

In Germany<\/a>, freedom of expression is a fundamental right, enshrined in law \u2014 this includes political satire, provided it doesn’t violate other laws.<\/p>\n

“Satire is actually mockery spiced with humor; criticism wrapped in humor,” says Tilly, “and Putin can’t stand criticism. Anyone who thinks differently ends up in court and, in the worst case, in some kind of prison camp.” Tilly suspects that this could also happen to him.<\/p>\n

For Tilly, the criminal complaint filed by the Russian government represents a new level of escalation. He is accused of defaming Russian state institutions, including the military and President Putin.<\/p>\n

Tilly’s 2023 carnival float, in which the Russian leader is depicted bathing in Ukrainian blood (headline photo), is said to have triggered the proceedings. “They say I defamed the Russian military and act out of self-interest.” The same accusations are often leveled against critics of the regime in Russia.<\/p>\n

Putin flexes his muscles<\/p>\n

Why exactly the charges against Tilly were not brought until December 2025 remains a mystery. To date, Tilly has neither received an indictment nor spoken to the court-appointed defense attorney. If the court finds him guilty, the artist could face a fine as well as imprisonment in a penal camp.<\/p>\n

But Putin’s long arm reaches beyond Russia, says Tilly: “The consequence is that I am simply no longer allowed to enter certain countries because they have extradition agreements with Russia, such as India or Serbia,\u00a0 Egypt and Indonesia, too.” The German Foreign Office explicitly advised him against traveling to these countries.<\/p>\n

Does Russia aim to set an example?<\/p>\n

It’s tradition in German carnivals to mock the authorities with satirical floats:\u00a0Hierarchies are reversed, and people are allowed to openly mock authorities, a concept known\u00a0as the “fool’s liberty,” or\u00a0“Narrenfreiheit” in German.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Centuries ago, the court jester was tasked with telling the rulers at princely and royal courts the bare truth about their actions, openly saying what others dared not say.<\/p>\n

“And that’s still the fool’s job today,” says Tilly, adding, “Of course, I didn’t make any false claims \u2014 I mocked the supreme warlord Putin, just as I do with Donald Trump, Iran’s mullahs, and [Turkey’s] Recep Tayyip Erdogan. That’s simply my job.<\/p>\n

\"AJacques Tilly has been portraying Putin as far back as 2015, when he made this floatImage: Federico Gambarini\/dpa\/picture alliance<\/p>\n

He built his first Putin float after the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya<\/a> in 2006. Tilly says he has been critical of the Russian president from the outset and doesn’t take the Russian state’s charges personally. It’s exactly what he would expect: These are values that must be defended, even with critical humor, he points out. “The charges are meant to say, ‘We know what you’re doing, and we have our methods of responding to it,’ and that’s the message to everyone, not just me.”<\/p>\n

Ruling regardless, Tilly will continue<\/p>\n

No matter what the verdict is, Tilly will not be intimidated. He even sees a positive side to the attention he’s getting. “Of course, it’s a nice confirmation that one’s own influence is far-reaching. I see that satire hurts, and that it hurts Putin, too.” This, he says, gives his work greater meaning.\u00a0“We’ll still continue to produce satire that gets to the heart of the matter.”<\/p>\n

This article has been translated from German.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Russian President Vladimir Putin bathes in the blood of Ukraine, while US President Donald Trump tears up the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":728895,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[2000,299,1824],"class_list":{"0":"post-728894","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-germany"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115979255998258918","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=728894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/728894\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/728895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=728894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=728894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=728894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}