Zoe Li
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Last Sunday, Berliners celebrated the 25th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall (see “300,000 Revelers Celebrate the Fall of the Berlin Wall–See the Pictures“). Now, in an unlikely homage to the iron curtain, an Indonesian artist plans to re-erect a portion of the wall in his home country.
Painter and sculptor Teguh Ostenrik bought four sections of the Berlin Wall a year after it came down and has kept them intact in his studio. The sections cost the artist the equivalent of $9,500 at the time, and the money was given to a charitable cause, funding a hospital in East Germany, according to the Wall Street Journal.
In the run up to the 25th anniversary celebrations, many were watching Ostenrik, expecting him to realize a long-planned public art installation using the pieces of the Wall as a centerpiece. The anniversary came and went, and Ostenrik is still searching for a space to display the installation, which he has titled Transcending Borders.
Ostenrik’s connection to the wall is partly sentimental: he lived in West Berlin for 10 years before the wall fell and could feel the presence of the wall everywhere he went. Even when he returned to Indonesia, the wall remained in his consciousness, becoming a symbol of the cultural barriers that he encountered back in his home country.
Portions of the Berlin Wall sit in Indonesian artist Teguh Ostenrik’s studio in Jakarta
Photo via: WSJ
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