LizaHadiz

A painting can give you a captivating glimpse of the past and narrate the history of a people. This is exactly what the work of Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675) presents to the world. Through his trademark paintings of middle-class Dutch women in an interior setting—with subtle details of tiles, decoration, furniture, musical instruments, dress, jewelry, and hair style—Vermeer provides a window to the prosperous life of the Dutch Golden Age.

The Dutch Golden Age spanned from 1588 to 1672, when the Dutch Empire was at its peak in science, the arts, the military, and trade, and was experiencing a cultural boom in the seventeenth century. Through the ships of the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the Dutch West India Company (WIC), the empire ruled the sea, gaining colonies in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. With these conquests, back home, the Dutch middle-class flourished.

The lifestyle of the affluent Dutch middle-class as seen in Vermeer’s paintings was made possible through no other than the exploitation, marginalization, and enslavement of the indigenous people in the colonies. The Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia), dubbed “the pearl of the East”, was an important colony for the Dutch empire as it secured the empire’s power over the spice trade.

Jayakarta (now Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia), a strategic harbor city, was burned down and conquered under the command of VOC official, Jan Pieterszoon Coen, in 1619. Coen rebuild the city on its ruins to become VOC’s new administrative base, which was subsequently renamed Batavia, after the Dutch’s mystical ancestors. Following the establishment of Batavia, to secure VOC’s monopoly of the spice trade, Coen seized Banda Island—formerly the sole producer of nutmeg. The Banda Massacre is inseparable from Coen’s legacy, where under his command, 14,000 local inhabitants were killed and over 1,000 enslaved, mainly sent to Batavia.

“By the last decades of the Dutch Golden Age, slaves of ethnic diversity comprised half of the Batavia population.”

Slave labor was an important commodity in the Dutch colonial empire. The function of the VOC administrative city of Batavia relied heavily on slaves acquired from various parts of the Dutch East Indies. By the last decades of the Dutch Golden Age, slaves of ethnic diversity comprised half of the Batavia population. Slaves lived in atrocious conditions but were fragmented as an oppressed group, mainly because they identified themselves by their ethnicity and not their oppression.

To strengthen Dutch political and economic domination, social relations were regulated, including race and gender relations. The city of Batavia was not only developed to replicate Amsterdam, but most importantly, it was designed to support racial segregation. The European colonizers mainly lived in the center of the city, others from non-European countries, such as the Chinese, Arabs, and Indians, lived closer to the center.

The indigenous people, many who were slaves brought in from across the archipelago, were concentrated further to the margins of the city, with some exceptions, particularly for those who worked in the household. This led to the practice of concubinage—the bondage of indigenous women—by VOC officers. Under cohabitation, these women (later referred to as nyai) worked to provide domestic and sexual services in the home of the VOC men living in Batavia as well as other foreign men.

For women enslaved in domestic settings, the labor offered an opportunity for vertical mobility, as they were often provided with clothing, money, and jewelry. However, they faced the double stigma of race and gender. The slave women under concubinage and their children were looked down by the local people. Children from these relationships were also not legally recognized by their father and the colonial state.

Furthermore, Coen was disgusted by the practice of interracial sexual relationships. In fact, Coen had attempted to curb, albeit unsuccessfully, the practice of concubinage by prohibiting it.

Coen may have not been too successful in regulating the sex life of his officers, but he was certainly successful in expanding the Dutch Empire, making him a hero of the Dutch Golden Age, at least until recent reflection. Once a hero, now he is considered a villain by some; part of the legacy of a celebrated era now condemned by many.

The Dutch Golden Age was made possible through economic exploitation, slavery, political oppression, and racial and sexual subjugation. This fact is of course not visible in the Dutch paintings of the era, such as the work of Vermeer, which depicted the lifestyle of a privileged few who were able to thrive through the atrocities against the colonized. Thus, to accurately describe this reality, some Dutch historians now refer to the era as simply, “the seventeenth century.”

-Some Thoughts from the Cappuccino Girl- (2022)

#history #Netherlands #Indonesia #Batavia #colonialism

More about the Dutch East Indies: VERMEER’S ART AND THE LEGACY OF COLONIALISM THE MAKING OF THE WESTERN FAMILY IN THE DUTCH EAST INDIES

Sources:

Fraga, Kaleena (2022) The Story of Batavia, The Indonesian City Violently Colonized by the Dutch. All That's Interesting. https://allthatsinteresting.com/batavia (Accessed 28 August 2022).

Ganbold, Nicole (2021) ‘Dutch Golden Age Explained.’ DailyArt Magazine. https://www.dailyartmagazine.com/dutch-golden-age-explained/ (Accessed 23 August 2022).

Kehoe, Marsely L. (2015) ‘Dutch Batavia: Exposing the Hierarchy of the Dutch Colonial City.’ Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Arts. https://jhna.org/articles/dutch-batavia-exposing-hierarchy-dutch-colonial-city/ (Accessed 28 August 2022).

Republika (2016) ‘Kisah Nyai dan Pergundikan di Batavia.’ Bagian 2 Republika https://republika.co.id/berita/nasional/umum/16/02/19/o2qyfh385-kisah-nyai-dan-pergundikan-di-batavia-bagian-2habis (Accessed 28 August 2022).

VOI (2022) 'Today’s History, May 28, 1619: Jan Pieterszoon Coen Conquered Jayakarta with Additional War Fleet from Maluku.' Voice of Indonesia. https://voi.id/en/memori/172731/history-today-may-28-1619-jan-pieterszoon-coen-conquer-jayakarta-with-additional-war-fleet-from-maluku (Accessed 28 August 2022).

Wikipedia (2022) Batavia, Dutch East Indies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batavia,_Dutch_East_Indies (Accessed 23 August 2022).

Wikipedia (2022) Dutch Golden Age. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Golden_Age (Accessed 23 August 2022).

Pictures:

Picture 1: A Lady Seated at a Virginal, 1672 by Johannes Vermeer (Wikimedia Commons) Picture 2: The Love Letter, 1669-1670 by Johannes Vermeer (Wikimedia Commons)