From the current issue of Private Eye satirical magazine, found in the Funny Old World column:
“The idea came to me during a city centre protest,” artist Marcel Walldorf told a press conference at the Academy of Fine Arts in Dresden, “when I thought about the riot cops who were there all day.”
“I saw male officers relieving themselves against a wall, and wondered how policewomen deal with this problem. The result is ‘Petra’, my first major work, a life-size sculpture of a female riot cop in helmet, black ski mask, and body armour, squatting with her combat trousers around her knees, exposing her buttocks, and pissing on the floor.”
Walldorf’s sculpture, which won the Leinemann Foundation’s Kunstpreis fur Nachwuchskunstler, was immediately condemned by politicians. “This co-called work of art is a disgrace,” declared Minister of the Interior Markus Ulbig. “It is an insult to policewomen, and against human dignity, and I am shocked that there are bodies who award prizes to so-called artists.”
But Walldorf was unrepentant. “The public response has been overwhelmingly positive, and I don’t understand why some people are attacking Petra. She even contains a special mechanism by which a liquid can be made to flow out of her genitals. But to avoid damaging the gallery’s wooden floor, I have substituted a puddle of simulated urine from gelatine for this exhibition.” (The Local, [Germany], 14/1/11 Spotter: Mal Function)