Exhibition View: Biennale Jogja XVI, Jogja National Museum, Yogyakarta
Di Tanah Orang Papua (Papuans Land)
Installation, video, and audio
Variable Dimensions
2021
In collaboration with Harun Rumbarar and Max Binur
For more than half a century, West Papua has been a part of Indonesia through annexation, a condition that continues to spark controversies to date. West Papua’s natural resources are the magnet for Indonesia and other countries, resulting in heated competition to occupy the region. Through Law No. 1 of 1967 concerning Foreign Investment and the contract executed by Soeharto in the same year, the land constituted ‘Motherland’ for Papuans slowly began to be controlled by the country. Investors instigated conflicts, committed violence, induced terror and fear, and forced people to evacuate until they could prevent the land and transform it into a ‘fertile land’ for them. These patterns were common among investors when they found a region with abundant natural resources.
This artwork presents fragments of stories that Arief got told about during his residency in Papua. Stories about the lives of Papuans that are not covered by media, as well as their heart-wrenching experiences of falling victim to the power of the country and its instruments whose existence has been attempted to be kept hidden. In making this artwork, Arief collaborated with the artists cum activists, Max Binur and Harun Rumbarar, who are keen to voice the problems in West Papua through the medium of music and film. The awareness to defend the culture and lives of Papuans inspired them to use these two media as part of weapons to archive memories of the turmoil occurring in West Papua.
At Biennale Jogja XVI, Narratives and Counter-Narratives Unite
Arief Budiman 