Agnes Christina

Agnes Christina (b.1987, Indonesia) is a multidisciplinary artist who is interested in the struggle that people face in life and, more importantly, how they deal with the struggle. Focusing on the rhythm that is created by humans in everyday life, Agnes presents her stories through various media such as theatre, performance, painting, embroidery, and fashion. 

Her theatre scripts have been published several times, and her visual artworks have been featured in exhibitions such as Bazaar Arts Jakarta, Artjog and Jogja Biennale (Korean Pavilion). Her fashion line, @Leafthief.id is growing to be a cult favourite around Indonesia and Singapore.

The body of work depicts Christina’s sentiment as a Chinese Indonesian assimilating from an urban area to the rural area. In Indonesia, there is an ongoing trend of urban dwellers moving permanently to live in the rural area to embrace a slow living pace, or generally a healthier lifestyle. 

For Chinese Indonesians, this move is not as easy and happy as it sounds. Chinese Indonesians are used to being banned from living and working in the rural areas. Human relationships are tested and questioned, especially in the beginning of trying to immerse into a new habitat. The easiest form of relationship is through a business transaction. Trust is gained when there is an exchange of monetary compensation with services or goods. 

In many rural areas in Indonesia, there are trends of growing plants for easy money, such as cloves, konnyaku roots, and lately, flat-leaf vanilla. The problem with growing vanilli is that the plant is a target for robbery. The robbers do not only target the vanilla pods, but the whole plant, because a single plant can be easily cut into pieces and sold as seedlings. This is a much quicker way to make money than waiting for the plant to bear vanilli pods. 

Being a Chinese Indonesian is just like a vanilla plant. Whenever they are trying to grow our roots deeply somewhere, some bad guys, through riots or political issues, would cut their families up, causing us to be separated and to move. Simultaneously, like a bee, they bring their own habits and quirks into a new place and pollinate a hybrid culture somewhere else.