» Read on issuu.com Targeting the Arts Documenting incidents of censorship has never been enough. From the very beginning Freemuse has attempted to put censorship of music and arts into a larger context. In 2015 we introduced INSIGHT – a series of articles providing readers with analytical stories on censorship of …

The regency of West Aceh has banned all outdoor concerts based on a recommendation from a group of Muslim scholars trained in Shari’a law, reported The Sydney Morning Herald on 7 April 2016. Ulema, the body of scholars, believed that outdoor concerts had “more disadvantages than advantages”, leading West Aceh …

According to a letter issued by the Indonesian Broadcasting Commission on 23 February 2016, male actors have been forbidden from behaving and dressing up as women on local tv, Indonesian news portal Jakarta Globe reported on 24 February 2016. The commission stated that the letter was circulated as a reminder …

The Indonesia Film Censorship Board (LSF) held an emergency meeting regarding Netflix’s recent global expansion and may ban the service from the country. “Last Saturday we watched the movies [available on Netflix]… there are some movies that we have forbid from being screened in the cinemas,” Ahmad Yani Basuki, the …

In Banda Aceh, on the northwestern tip of the island of Sumatra, there is a small and often misunderstood group of punks that have become labelled as a “social disease” as Shari’a law continues to grow over the last 10 years since the Indian Ocean tsunami. ‘Street Punk! Banda Aceh …

Cultural and human rights activists have expressed outrage and concern after police placed a ban on an arts event scheduled to take place at Jakarta’s Taman Ismail Marzuki cultural centre on 15 December 2015. According to the Jakarta Post, the police cited “practical reasons of security” as their reason, rather than any …

The Ubud Writers and Readers Festival, one of South-East Asia’s biggest cultural and literary events, running from 28 October to 1 November 2015, has been forced by local authorities to cancel some of its key programs. The censorship is unprecedented in the 12-year history of the festival, reported Indonesia correspondent …

Punks face the tightening grip of Shari’a law in north Sumatra. This is documented in ‘Street Punk! Banda Aceh’ – a film about a punk community that refuses to die. Freemuse asked the film’s production team, director Maria Bakkalapulo and producer Niall Macaulay to tell about the struggle. By Maria …

Countries that often object to sexual content – Malaysia, Indonesia, Zimbabwe, Kenya and India – have banned ‘Fifty Shades’ from cinema theatres. Authorities in Russia’s North Caucasus have also banned the film. In Malaysia, the head of the film censorship board called it “more pornography than a movie”, according to …

The Indonesian artist FX Harsono received an inaugural Freedom of Art award in Singapore on 20 January 2015. It was presented to him by the U.S. ambassador to Singapore and the director of Art Stage Singapore. The Joseph Balestier Award for the Freedom of Art honours an artist or curator from Southeast …