The Agency of traditional Architecture in Indonesia: Locating Indonesian Identity through the Course of Time
The Agency of traditional Architecture in Indonesia: Locating Indonesian Identity through the Course of Time, Yasmin Tri Aryani
2019 M+ / Design Trust Research Fellow Yasmin Tri Aryani’s research focuses on the analysis and visualization of government-funded buildings in multi-ethnic and postcolonial countries. Yasmin Tri Aryani, an Indonesian independent writer, will address the instrumentalization and legitimation of traditional architecture in Indonesia, from the early postcolonial period through to the present. Traditional architecture has been used for different political agendas in Indonesia throughout the twentieth century, and it has also served as a reference for architects seeking new alternatives. Through a series of specific case studies, Aryani’s research will unpack the ways in which the state and architects appropriate this form of architecture, while considering the unintended consequences of the ethnic-based identity construction that can be read in buildings in Indonesia.
2019 M+ / Design Trust Research Fellow Yasmin Tri Aryani’s research focuses on the analysis and visualization of government-funded buildings in multi-ethnic and postcolonial countries. Yasmin Tri Aryani, an Indonesian independent writer, will address the instrumentalization and legitimation of traditional architecture in Indonesia, from the early postcolonial period through to the present. Traditional architecture has been used for different political agendas in Indonesia throughout the twentieth century, and it has also served as a reference for architects seeking new alternatives. Through a series of specific case studies, Aryani’s research will unpack the ways in which the state and architects appropriate this form of architecture, while considering the unintended consequences of the ethnic-based identity construction that can be read in buildings in Indonesia.
Yasmin Tri Aryani, an independent writer based in Eindhoven, will address the instrumentalisation and legitimation of traditional architecture in Indonesia, from the early postcolonial period through to the present. Traditional architecture has been used for different political agendas in Indonesia throughout the twentieth century, and it has also served as a reference for architects seeking new alternatives. Through a series of specific case studies, Aryani’s research will unpack the ways in which the state and architects appropriate this form of architecture, while considering the unintended consequences of the ethnic-based identity construction that can be read in buildings in Indonesia.
The M+ / Design Trust Research Fellowship programme consists of two separate fellowships investigating issues related to architecture and design. One supports research projects focused on Hong Kong and the Greater Bay Area in an Asian or global context, and the second supports research projects related to Asia more broadly, closely in line with the curatorial position of M+, the Hong Kong museum dedicated to visual culture of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Past fellows include: Ling Fan (2015); Joseph Grima (2016); the team of Daniel Cooper and Juliana Kei (2016); Thomas Daniell (2017); and Hugh Davies (2018); the team of Fan Lok Yi and Sampson Wong (2018).
More details about M+ / Design Trust Research Fellowship here
- 2019
- Fellow: Yasmin Tri Aryani
Yasmin Tri Aryani graduated with a MA degree in Design Curating and Writing at Design Academy Eindhoven in the Netherlands. Aryani has contributed to various articles on interior design and architecture since 2012 with her research interest focused around the analysis and visualisation of government-funded buildings in multi-ethnic and postcolonial countries. Aryani’s project “Mapping the Way Home: The Role of Architecture in Constructing Contested Notions of Identity in Indonesia” was nominated for the Gijs Bakker award. Through the M+/ Design Trust research fellowship, Aryani aims to explore how indigenous architecture has been instrumentalised in representing national identity, in relation to ethnic majorities and minorities in the country.
- Organisation: M+, West Kowloon Cultural District, Design Trust
About M+
M+ is a museum dedicated to collecting, exhibiting, and interpreting visual art, design and architecture, moving image, and Hong Kong visual culture of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. In Hong Kong’s West Kowloon Cultural District, we are building one of the largest museums of modern and contemporary visual culture in the world, with a bold ambition to establish ourselves as one of the world’s leading cultural institutions. Our aim is to create a new kind of museum that reflects our unique time and place, a museum that builds on Hong Kong’s historic balance of the local and the international to define a distinctive and innovative voice for Asia’s twenty-first century.About the West Kowloon Cultural District
Located on Hong Kong’s Victoria Harbor, the West Kowloon Cultural District is one of the largest cultural projects in the world. Its vision is to create a vibrant new cultural quarter for Hong Kong. With a complex of theatres, performance spaces, and museums, the West Kowloon Cultural District will produce and host world-class exhibitions, performances, and cultural events, as well as provide twenty-three hectares of public open space, including a two-kilometer waterfront promenade.About Design Trust
Design Trust was established in 2014 by Hong Kong Ambassadors of Design, a registered charity in Hong Kong since 2007, as a grant-funding platform. Design Trust supports creative projects that develop expertise and build research initiatives and content related to Hong Kong and the Greater Bay Area. Working across a multiplicity of design disciplines, from graphics, media, and architecture to the built environment, Design Trust aims to actively accelerate creative research, design, and the development of meaningful projects that advocate for the positive role of design.