Selintas Selalu, 2024

Vincent Ruijters’ Selintas Selalu (2024) is a kinetic installation that examines identity, heritage and displacement through an interplay of light, shadow and fabric. Based on the artist’s research into his Chinese-Indonesian roots, the artwork captures the aesthetics of this hybrid culture by featuring traditional references to Chinese-Indonesian communities.

Ruijters’ deeply personal exploration is realized in a vein-like steel structure from where strips of red fabric hang, dyed with a symbolic pigment from Lasem, Indonesia. The base borrows its petal shape from the kawung motif common in Javanese batik. Surrounding the centerpiece are standing lamps with spikes reminiscent of kembang kelapa decorations found in Betawi culture.

At the heart of the installation, a moving light bulb casts an immersive shadow play on the walls and floor, inviting viewers to contemplate how ancestral culture and migration ripple into the present, shaping our ever-changing identity.