Toko Waar Is Thuis
(2020 - current)
Previously named Elders from Elsewhere
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Proces-based art project.
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Artistic research to regenerate lost narratives and a decolonized perception of history:
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How can you circumvent the arrow of progress thinking in a colonized past, break down the construct of state narratives to arrive at more meaningful stories.
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Over the past four years, I have been investigating the whitewashing of my ancestral tribe, the Minahasa in Indonesia, with project “Toko Waar is Thuis”.
What I previously knew about my Indo background, I learned from my father, who himself had been torn from his roots in his teenage years. He turned into an eccentric man who ultimately embraced his otherness in the east of the Netherlands. He kept his Indo identity together with improvisation, fantasy and showmanship in his small exotic supermarket, a toko. There he wrapped customers around his fingers with charm and beautiful stories, and introduced many spices into a Dutch kitchen. I grew up in that toko. Filled of stories that are not quite true, but have a poetic quality and need to be read between the lines. They reveal a longing. Greedy for more.
Now I do something similar to my father. But instead of products and spices, I use moving images and voice as means to interpret a faded past and make it part of the conversation and the present here. I collect stories, artifacts, fragments, symbols, clues in nature and archives, remnants and floating feelings. With this I feed an ecosystem-like structure from which I draw essayistic video work and installations.
Supported by:
Stimuleringsfonds voor de Creatieve Industrie
Instituut voor Beeld & Geluid
KF Hein fonds
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The following video portret was made by Roel van Tour, interview Maarten Westerveen, concept by Koehorst in 't Veld for Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie during early stages of my research:
In the following talk show on Representation within audiovisual design practices, I was asked about my project a year in. At Dutch Design Week 2021, moderated by Nelly Dos Reis for Stimuleringsfonds:
The motherland is a dream.
Mountainous, hidden in fog with grumbling sulfur bubbling up from her hot springs.
BACKGROUND
War and colonial rule have left big holes in many Indonesian family histories, silencing the social memory. In order to understand my own bastard identity and to come to true authenticity as a maker I want to go further back than these conflicts. All the way back. To the soil that feeds the plants. The dark sand. The volcano. Back to the natural landscape of my ancestral tribe.
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PRESENTATION FORMS
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I am experimenting with different kinds of process-based presentation methods that can develop and evolve over time. Starting from a fragmented mind, embracing complexity and the non-linear/rhizomatic workings of the brain, unraveling slowly into a story.
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Artist Talks:
1 November 2022 KF Hein Fonds
20 October 2021 Stimuleringsfonds at Dutch Design Week
12 February 2024 “How to deepen your roots through artistic practice” for Blender at De Nijverheid
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Published writings':
Blog #1 - Vertrekpunt
Blog #2 - De jonge Walian
Blog #3 - Er zit een kracht in de berg
(all published at K.F. Hein Fonds)
Manifest for the Soilless
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Exhibitions (physical):
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Ik Kies Mijn Kleur
at A0 expo | April 2020 Daalsetunnel, Utrecht
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Elders
at KunstKoers De Nijverheid | Mei - sep 2021, Utrecht
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Ergens Anders / Somehow Different
at Cineart x NNF | okt 2021, Utrecht
and at Atelierroute Utrecht | okt 2021, Utrecht
and at Kunsthal Kloof | nov 2021, Utrecht
Milking It
at Exhibition Research Lab | may 2022, ACPA Den Hague
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Een fragment uit onze toko 01
& Een fragment uit onze toko 02
as part of To Belong group exhibition at Troef | aug 2023
Roem Leiden
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Levering 01: Van Fruit en Vulkaan
(single-channel version)
15 min. essay film with environment
Set in Teylers Museum, Netherland's oldest museum funded from world-explorations and the urge to collect objects, this video work gains an extra layer of consequence.
during Boring Festival weekend | jan 2024
Teylers Museum, Haarlem
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Shelves full with stacks of spice trays. A buzzing refrigerator with chilled tropical fruits in cling film. Large bales of rice lie between stacked boxes of stock. You can walk between the exotic seasonings and foods. But, unlike in real life, this shop has no color.
