GEGERBOYO in the Elleboogkerk

In the new installation, Eroded Borders the Javanese collective GEGERBOYO focuses on the constantly changing meaning of borders and territory. The work shows how these have emerged and shifted throughout history in the Indonesian archipelago: from Hindu-Buddhist empires such as Mataram and Majapahit and Muslim Mataram, colonial rule by Portugal, Britain and mainly the Netherlands, the Japanese occupation and finally the independence struggle and post-colonial period. These historical shifts in power were often accompanied by new forms of territory demarcation, with borders increasingly used by colonial powers from the sixteenth century onwards to maintain control over trade in valuable commodities such as cloves, tea, coffee, sugar, quinine and nutmeg. In the process, they took on tangible forms, such as forts, ports and high fences, which not only expressed territorial power but also defined cultural relations and economic structures. Even in today’s world, this history still operates and the demarcation of land remains a source of conflict, in which power relations, religion, ethnicity and ideology play a defining role – often at the expense of lives, culture and livelihoods.