Wander through a luxury travel guide. This is how the visitor experiences the Great Indonesia exhibition in the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam. In addition, the exhibition ‘scuffs’ where it needs to.
Unity in diversity. In other words: Bhinneka tunggal ika. This is the motto of the Republic of Indonesia. But it could also effortlessly be the motto of The Great Indonesia Exhibition in Amsterdam’s Nieuwe Kerk, where the public will be short on eyes and ears to see all the objects – from stuffed exotic animals such as the Komodo dragon to batik, kris and the jacket of the sultan with supernatural powers – to see and process film fragments and information.
When you look up, you have the feeling of wandering through a luxury travel guide: beautiful, blown-up photos of Indonesia everywhere. “The exhibition serves as a springboard for further exploration of the archipelago. But it is also an invitation to visit Indonesia,” Hilmar Farid, Director General of the Ministry of Education and Culture in Jakarta, tells the visitors.
The ambitious presentation is composed as ‘a polyphonic biography’, says Marlies Kleiterp, who led the international team of more than a hundred experts who created the exhibition. “We didn’t make the decision overnight,” she says. “Because how do you do justice to a country as large and culturally diverse as Indonesia? We highlight known and unknown facets of the archipelago, which consists of 17,508 islands, of which 990 are permanently inhabited. Visitors take a journey from Bali to Borneo and the Moluccas.”
Pace goal avoided
Don’t expect an atmosphere full of nostalgia. “We have consciously avoided the tempo targetoe haze, which has clouded our image of Indonesia for so long. We show that long before the VOC discovered the country, there were important kingdoms, such as the Hindu-Buddhist empire of Majapahit,” Kleiterp explains.
According to her, the exhibition also ‘scuffs’ where it should. “In addition to the beauty of the country and the culture, we do not close our eyes to the atrocities that took place there: the slavery past in the East, the colonial system, but also the Second World War, the Japanese occupation and the Revolusi period, everything is covered. bid. You could call it a history lesson that the Netherlands never had.”
Fortunately, Schools does not visit the colorful exhibition. Rather kaleidoscopic. The exhibition makers have not maintained a chronological order, so that the audience, wandering through the ambulatory of the Nieuwe Kerk, suddenly falls from traditional ancestor worship, for example, into the Merdeka year 1945, the year in which Sukarno declared independence on August 17. “We also make it clear that freedom was not so much fought for, but defended. Because there has always been resistance,” Kleiterp emphasizes.
Teddy bear with red jacket
Former East Indies visitors and their descendants – at least two million (Indian) Dutch have roots in the Emerald Belt – can rest assured: the Japanese camps and the bloody Bersiap period, which followed Sukarno’s ‘Proklamasi’, are also mentioned. The teddy bear with a red jacket, which was found in one of the Japanese internment camps, is touching. Just as sad is a long, typed list of names of Dutch people who were murdered in Tegal between October 10 and 12, 1945 by the mostly young freedom fighters.
Some highlights that were previously announced are unfortunately missing. These are loans that would come from the Museum Nasional in Jakarta, such as the Ukar Mus (43 gold plates that together form an image of a deceased monarch) and the famous ninth century gold Ramayana bowl. Due to a fire that raged in the museum in September, it was not possible to bring the valuable treasures to Amsterdam on time. Seven works of art by contemporary painters and sculptors, including the acclaimed Heri Dono, are expected in December.
The Great Indonesia Exhibition, until April 1, 2024 in De Nieuwe Kerk, Amsterdam