Barkcloth – Dark Cloth

I feel deeply concerned with retrieving lost crafts, their meaning and history. In Indonesia’s rapidly transforming cultural landscape, languages, knowledge systems, traditions, and material practices are vanishing at an alarming rate. Barkcloth – Dark Cloth continues my ongoing dialogue and collaboration with Agus Ongge, an artist from Papua—the easternmost province of Indonesia—through the use of barkcloth, a versatile and culturally rich material. Embedded within its textures and patterns are stories of resilience, reflecting the Papuan people’s enduring struggle for recognition, voice, and rights.
Few people know that painted barkcloth blankets from the 1920s were brought to Paris by Jacques Viot, where they caught the attention of key Surrealist figures such as André Breton, Max Ernst, Jean Arp, and Joan Miró. These works had a significant influence on the development of the Surrealist movement, yet their origins and cultural significance remain largely overlooked and unacknowledged.