Recall/Recalibrate (2025)

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Research website

Sakola Kautamaan Isteri, girls' school in Bandung. Collectie Wereldmuseum TM-FV-0507098. See: Marjolein van Pagee and Raistiwar Pratama, ‘Navigating Colonial Politics: Dewi Sartika’s School for Native Girls in Bandung’.

Wicker baskets, Java, ca. 1936. Leiden University Libraries, KITLV 804549. See: ‘'Dangerous Competitors' The Dutch Ethical Policy (1901) and the Establishment of Craft Schools in East Java’ by Marjolein van Pagee.

A 1930 photo from the Oudheidkundige Dienst (by Jean Jacques (Jan) de Vink) of a relief from the Mantingan mosque located in the Japara Regency and established in 1559 AD by the female ruler Kali Nyamat. The depicted lotus flower motif was seen as a remnant from the so-called ‘Hindu-Javanese’ period and therefore considered suitable for Yogya silver. Collectie Wereldmuseum TM-6316-38b. See: ‘A rejuvenation cure? Inventing Yogya Silver, ‘Saving’ a Perishing Javanese Industry’ by Marjolein van Asdonck.

Kartini with her husband Raden Adipati Djojoadiningrat, regent of Rembang, 1903. Photo by Tee Han Sioe. Leiden University Library, KITLV 15470. See: ‘Decolonising the Myth of Kartini’ by Saut Situmorang.

Mas Pirngadi, pattern of a chair mat from Aceh, Jasper & Pirngadi, De inlandsche kunstnijverheid in Nederlandsch Indië: Het Vlechtwerk (I), 1912, p. 353. Jasper donated at least twenty of his chair mats to the collection of the Wereldmuseum. See: ‘’A firm nudge’, Politics of ‘Ethical’ Reform Through ‘Native Arts and Crafts’ in Dutch-Occupied Indonesia’ by Rosa te Velde.

Recall/Recalibrate is a research platform on material culture and ‘ethical imperialism’, aiming to rethink what counts as ‘design history’. The project examines how the Dutch ‘Ethical Policy’ materialised through interventions in education, craft and material culture in Dutch-occupied Indonesia around 1900. How did the supposed ‘encouragement’ of indigenous arts and crafts coincide with the violent expansion of Dutch colonial rule at the time? And what happens when these histories are read together rather than kept apart?

Through archival research, collaborative writing and an online essay series, the project traces how colonial ideas about culture, progress, gender and education became embedded in material practices. It also asks how this ‘cultural archive’ continues to shape what we value, teach and reproduce in design education today.

I developed and edited a research website and essay series in collaboration with Histori Bersama and the Research Center for Material Culture. Funded by Creative Industries Fund NL.

The project was presented during 80 Years of Indonesia Merdeka at Amare, The Hague.

My essay, A Firm Nudge, received the Design History Society Writing Prize.

www.recalibrate.nl

listen to podcast episode by the Design History Society

some of the texts are translated into Bahasa Indonesia by Histori Bersama

Authors
Marjolein van Asdonck
Raistiwar Pratama
Saut Situmorang
Marjolein van Pagee
Rosa te Velde

Readers
Fitria Jelyta
Lisa Baumgarten
Mark Oomen

Copy-editing/Proofreading
Harriet Foyster
Iris Pissaride
Marjolein van Pagee

Image Research
Rosa te Velde

Graphic Design
Zuzana Kostelanská