Bad Campaign Posters May Be the Best Thing About Indonesia’s 2019 Elections

For the past six months, Indonesia’s streets have been littered with the visual garbage that is general election campaign banners.

Take literally any poster out there and I guarantee you that it will feature all of these: low quality pictures of candidates, weird poses, way too many clashing colors and different fonts. Ugly as they may be, these posters don't come cheap.

A candidate for seats in the House of Representatives from the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), Masinton Pasaribu, spent Rp 5 billion ($355,000 USD) on campaign materials over six months. You can find his face plastered in the tiny alleyways of South Jakarta, all the way to the main roads of Central Jakarta.

It makes you think, these people spend a fortune and even risk going bankrupt for this kind of branding? Come on, what was going through these candidate's mind when they decided to do something like this:

To make it worse, most of these posters weren't even put up right. Sometimes whoever's responsible for them just stick them to someone's fences or random electricity poles. It's become such a problem that the Election Supervisory Board (Bawaslu) recorded that 13,578 campaign materials in Jakarta had to be repositioned due to careless placement.

And as politicians are competing for Millennial and Gen Z votes, it's become the new normal for politicians to include pop culture references and parodies on their posters. So you could argue that these embarrassingly bad posters are some of the best things that have come out of this election season.

Before we say goodbye to these posters, that will be taken down after Wednesday's election, VICE sat down with two rising young graphic designers and pop culture experts Farid Stevy Asta and Yusuf Ismail (who goes by the moniker Fluxcup) to talk about how old election campaign posters, and what we can appreciate from the tacky new ones. Here's what they had to say:

VICE: What do you think about how these campaign posters have changed over time?
Yusuf Ismail: The graphic design on the banners is entertaining, and if you compare them to the posters during the last election, I don’t see much difference.

Farid Stevy Asta: I feel the decline in quality has been pretty rapid. I enjoy Indonesian campaign graphics from decades ago. For example, during our first-ever election in 1955, they had cool party logos and some really strong campaign posters. Just Google them. Nowadays, you see more colors and variations you see, but the posters also increasingly fail to perform their function as propaganda tools. I mean, does anyone in 2019 actually look at a campaign banner, have an epiphany, and think to themselves, "He’s the one I’ve been looking for all these years, he’s me, he’s us, I’m going to vote for him!”

Obviously, time's changed. Photoshop is a thing. Why are campaign posters still so… terrible? Do political candidates just have bad taste?
Yusuf: No matter how much technology advances, no matter how good the user is, if you don’t have an advanced taste, that’s when you get that visual garbage.

Farid: Highly skilled designers and visual communicators who work for politicians certainly don’t have the freedom to explore. That’s the brief the designers get, so that’s the result they come up with. Do candidates not have a highbrow taste in art? I don’t know, but as far as I can see, the ones that have good taste in art don’t run for office.

So far, posters that seem "creative" usually borrow elements from pop culture, like stealing a PUBG design. What do you guys think makes a good, persuasive, and aesthetically pleasing poster?
Yusuf: A poster that’s clear, informative, and up to par with publication norms. Don’t throw in all that weird stuff. Don’t use those outrageous Photoshop effects. Take pity on the citizens who have taste, it just pollutes our vision. And don’t stick them wherever you please! We’re confronted daily with narcissistic faces with no clear credibility or urgency for their constituents. We don’t even know what they stand for, or what their programs are. How can they expect us to vote so blindly?

Here are some tips for the candidates. If you plan to hold a seat in office, then step up your campaign game, especially since most voters are young people now. Make vlogs on YouTube, so we know what you have to offer and what your plans are. Do Q&As on digital platforms. Follow trends to your ability..

Have you two ever been offered to design a campaign poster? If you did, or if you turned it down, why?
Yusuf: I’ve turned a bunch down. I choose candidates based on their credibility to lead, and of course my feelings. When it comes to who you’re voting for, that should stay a secret. Not everyone needs to know.

Farid: I’ve never been offered. God exists, and He never tests you beyond your abilities. God is all-knowing, so He must think that political projects are outside my capabilities.

Do you think campaign designs will improve in the 2024 elections?
Yusuf: We never know what trends will exist in the future. But I’m anticipating something huge.

Farid: I’m a graphic designer who also writes lyrics and sings in a band, and make a bunch of art. I’m no shaman. Go home VICE, you’re drunk.

This article originally appeared on VICE Indonesia.