Contesting colonial (hi)stories: (Post)colonial imaginings of Southeast Asia
- Submitting institution
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Edinburgh Napier University
- Unit of assessment
- 32 - Art and Design: History, Practice and Theory
- Output identifier
- 1305544
- Type
- D - Journal article
- DOI
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10.1017/S0022463420000508
- Title of journal
- Journal of Southeast Asian Studies
- Article number
- -
- First page
- 343-371
- Volume
- 51
- Issue
- 3
- ISSN
- 0022-4634
- Open access status
- Compliant
- Month of publication
- September
- Year of publication
- 2020
- URL
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- Supplementary information
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- Request cross-referral to
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- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
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- Research group(s)
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- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- No
- Additional information
- The research for this article originated from a ten days postcolonial photography workshop I conducted in Indonesia in 2012. The invited 11 Southeast Asian artists explored artistic possibilities of colonial photographic material, which was made available to them in digital format. The result was exhibited at the Noorderlicht festival in 2013, entitled “Revisiting Colonial Narrative.” The works have been exhibited, among others, in Paris Photo (2013), Singapore Art Museum (2014), Noorderlicht Gallery (2015), Chobi Mella Photo Festival, Dhaka (2017). Despite the rapid scholarly attention to the practice of photography in the colony since 1990s, the workshop was the first of the kind in Southeast Asia, where scholars and artists discussed and produced creative work in the context of an regional and multidisciplinary collaboration. The article reflects how artists used colonial archives to critically investigate the ways national, regional and personal (hi)stories in the former colonies have been informed and shaped by the colonial past. The analysis focuses on how the artists’ use of digital media contests and reconfigures the use, truth value and power of the colonial archive as an entity and institution. Through a close reading of works from Thai photographer Dow Wasiksiri, Malaysian artist Yee I-Lann, and Indonesian photographer Agan Harahap, the article examines the impact of digital technologies on the material, conceptual and ideological premises of colonial archives in the digital era. By repurposing colonial archival material and circulating their work online and major exhibitions, they represent the first regional endeavour to challenge the notions of originality, authenticity, ownership and control associated with the colonial archive. They reclaim colonial (hi)stories by making them part of a democratic, expanding, postcolonial (photographic) archive. The workshop was supported by Noorderlicht Photography (the Netherlands), Langgeng Gallery (Indonesia), Tropenmusem, Rijksmuseum, and KITLV (the Netherlands) and National Gallery of Australia.
- Author contribution statement
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- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
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