ARTICLE
13 July 2010
Hera Diani
There are often many controversies surrounding Barack Obama, especially in Jakarta, the city where he spent some of his childhood years. The brief history of Obama’s life in Jakarta has been immortalized, among others, in the form of a sculpture of little Obama, which turned out to find so many opponents. What does this brouhaha actually signify? Global politics versus nationalism? The clash of monumental ideas with inferiority complex? Hera Diani presents it to you. |
24 June 2010
Altering legacy, steering history: The corrupted dioramas in the National Monument Museum of History
JJ Rizal
History as shown on Monas' dioramas, resulted from New Order's political manipulation. For years, millions of visitors, including children from every corner of Indonesia paying mandatorily visits through their school programs, has been and still is witnessing the über-militaristic Indonesian history hogwash. Historian JJ Rizal examines how and why the historical corruption in the dioramas was allowed to happen. |
06 April 2010
Yosafat Hermawan Trinugraha
After the May Riot in 1998, the urban villages in Solo guard themselves. The seemingly protective fences surreptitiously make people forget. To Yosafat Hermawan Trinugraha, it is peculiar how the kampong gates exist in the midst of the celebration about the success of Solo urban management scheme and how friendly it has been to the poor commoners. The kampong, the urban village, is the last bastion for urban pluralism. With the fenced-in kampongs, the hidden memories will someday find their way out and rebel. |
22 March 2010
Farid Rakun - Ardi Yunanto
The building that formerly housed the Immigration Office of Central Jakarta is truly in misery. It has been left abandoned, caught in a tug of war, looted, sold, bought back, then made into Buddha Bar. Now, after the news about the building gradually disappears from the media, does it mean that the problem has actually been concluded? What can we do to save it? The Karbon Journal interviews Pradaningrum Mijarto, an observer of heritage buildings, to answer these questions. |
22 February 2010
Anissa S. Febrina
Hidden Jakarta, an anti-luxury organized trip, is the latest development of a nasty-yet-gorgeous market condition in which everything is for sale. Anissa S. Febrina, who decided to dig deeper into her voyeuristic side, tried to explain the phenomena by paying poorism, a newly popular term, a tempting glance. Also considering the subject-object interaction happening through the process, this essay could be considered as an act of foreplay. |
15 November 2009
Pradaningrum Mijarto
Kota Tua Jakarta is the “Queen of the East”, a designated city heritage. However, sometime in 2008, the Fatahillah Park, the heart of this heritage area, was used as a parking lot for a grand wedding ceremony at the Art and Ceramics Museum. Pradaningrum Mijarto reviews the doubtful state of health of “the queen” due to too many conflicting interests and too much indifference in the efforts to revitalize her. |
03 October 2009
Haris Firdaus
From the ban to wear European clothes for the indigenous students at the STOVIA, the controversies regarding the use of hijab in 1979 – 1991, to the subsequent students’ resistance against the policy of wearing uniforms, there have been endless problems pertaining to the policy. Haris Firdaus does not only offer us a sketch of such resistances, but also observes the changing trends of uniforms in the city of Solo, and uses three Indonesian films from three different eras to define five categories of resistance against school uniform. |
26 August 2009
Grace Samboh
Grace Samboh is not originally from Yogyakarta, but she feels uneasy seeing how her city of residence is continuously portrayed. In this essay, she describes the peculiar parts of the films created by directors whom she thinks are satisfied enough with being local tourists in Yogyakarta. |
27 June 2009
Ifan Adriansyah Ismail
The movie Taksi (Arifin C. Noer, 1990), starring Rano Karno and Meriam Bellina, collected six Citra awards at the time when the issue of the city took center stage, when a “Jakarta-centric” perspective became increasingly prevalent. What kind of ‘voice’ does the movie record in its narrative, and how does Taksi document the historical traces of the city space in Jakarta? Ifan Adriansyah Ismail reviews it for you. |
29 May 2009
Irma Chantily
In collaboration with the itinerant photographers at the National Monument (Monas), Daniel Kampua selected works by these photographers and took a group picture of all the photographers. The results of this collaboration were exhibited at Monas in February 2009. Irma Chantily reviews a variety of new interactions betweeen Monas, the visitors, and the itinerant photographers, generated by this photography project. |
20 April 2009
Mahatmanto
The map of the city does not have to be defined by monuments, which have been made to last, but it can also be determined by temporary denizens who come and go. The city have always been decorated by informal signs. From Yogyakarta, Mahatmanto, an architect, presents us with his observation. |
01 July 2008
Ronny Agustinus
Aside from separating subversions into five categories, Ronny Agustinus discusses about the damage of patent right. Indonesia follows and ratifies Uruguay Round as well as other WTO agreements during the corrupt, dictatorial regime that the people had not chosen. The legitimacy of the ratification must therefore be questioned. Do we want to continue being the “willing victims”? |