When Nazif Lopulissa’s grandfather—born in the Moluccas and forcibly migrated to the Netherlands in the 1950s—visited his studio, he accidentally left behind his scarf from the Moluccas. Unnoticed, it lay in a corner for years. A few months after his grandfather passed away, Nazif found the small piece of fabric and decided to incorporate it into his work, as a gateway to a story he hadn’t paid attention to before.

His first instinct was to cut the scarf apart and then sew it back together, but that felt too direct, both conceptually and emotionally. The longer he looked at the woven fabric, the more fascinated he became by the technique behind it. Ikat, a traditional Indonesian weaving method, involves arranging and dyeing threads before weaving them against undyed threads to create a patterned fabric. This technique became the starting point for a new direction in Nazif’s work.

In 2023, Nazif saw for the first time a photo showing his young parents with him as a baby. The small image was tucked away in a family member’s box. His father on the right, his mother on the left, and baby Nazif in the middle. In a way, the small family portrait captures the essence of his artistic practice: the Moluccan lineage of his mother on the left, and the Turkish lineage of his father on the right. Beyond integrating childhood memories, such as those of his grandparents, into his paintings and sculptures, he also wants to explore and communicate the more universal stories visible in this photo—histories that have been hidden, stored away, needing to be uncovered; stories about migration, colonialism, and the ways shame can drape itself over our reality.

KNIL and the Moluccas

During the Indonesian War of Independence (1945–1949), colonized Moluccan men fought on the Dutch side as KNIL soldiers, opposing the Indonesian independence movement. When Indonesia became independent in 1949, the KNIL was disbanded, and many Moluccan ex-soldiers were forcibly relocated to the Netherlands. In 1951, hundreds arrived with their families at the port of Rotterdam. In the following years, they were largely ignored by the Dutch government, remained stateless for a long time, and lived under appalling conditions, such as in the former concentration camp in Vught. This was despite the fact that this group had served the Netherlands for years at great personal risk, often at the expense of local communities. They had risked everything and were met with neglect. The resulting shame colored both the national historical record, where these events were omitted from textbooks and television programs, and private Moluccan homes in the Netherlands. Silence persisted.

New Paintings

A key work is Invoke Memory, Cannibalising Myself from 2023. In Nazif’s studio, two canvases hang closely together, forming a single work. Abstract shapes appear on the surfaces—glowing spots against a dark background. The canvases are woven using the ikat technique, creating a structured, square pattern of colored and white areas. Photoprints are then interwoven with a translucent curtain. At first glance, the viewer may not notice, but with closer attention, a group portrait emerges on the left canvas. The faces have literally faded; only white and orange patches remain. It is a portrait of a group of Moluccan KNIL soldiers. The right canvas is based on a landscape photo of Saparua, one of the Moluccan islands. The two printed photos are layered and bleached—the soldiers above, the landscape below—so that the soldiers’ faces leave an imprint on Saparua’s printed landscape. The bleach’s white patches disrupt the lush nature.

Nazif’s grandfather, a KNIL soldier, came from the village of Tuhahah on the island of Saparua. Invoke Memory, Cannibalising Myself addresses both this personal history and the broader story of ex-soldiers and their families. The two canvases reveal the aftermath of Dutch colonialism, showing how colonized individuals were used as pawns, forced to deny their own backgrounds, and ultimately erased from history by the colonizer.

Bleach

Nazif often works with bleach. He places objects or materials on fabric and applies bleach over them, leaving behind silhouettes where the objects protected the underlying cloth. Bleach always reacts with the surface and cleans it. No other material seemed more suitable for the direction his work had taken—revealing and concealing histories. Bleach also references his mother’s work as a cleaner. There is a sense of urgency in using bleach: it stings the eyes, burns the lungs, and acts quickly. Because bleach clings to the objects Nazif arranges for spraying, a necessary side effect is the sacrifice of those objects—like photographs, like memories, they inevitably distort and degrade.

In 2024 and 2025, Nazif visited Saparua three times, the Moluccan island where his grandparents grew up. He conducted research for his practice and renovated the dilapidated family house still standing there. “The house forms a direct connection to my family history and my grandparents. It represents not just a physical place, but the legacy of my grandfather and the history he built. I wanted to prevent it from being lost. This project is not only personal but essential for my artistic practice. Preserving the house allows me to say I truly come from there. The restoration was done together with my fiancée Laura and the villagers, creating an immediate bond with the community. By physically working with the walls, plants, and restoration, I gained a deeper connection to the place. Every crack, every detail I learned. I now know this house better than my house in Amsterdam.”

He uses the house partly as a studio, producing much of his work on Saparua. There, he also works with bleach to capture the island’s landscapes. Aware of bleach’s harmful effects, Nazif initially hesitated about cutting leaves and branches to use in a new series: should he really cut plants and spread chemicals in the air? A local resident, however, was surprised at his “Western” caution: they were outdoors, and plenty of plants were always available.

Nazif reached a compromise: he would only use branches that had already fallen or were cut by locals.

One of the bleach works he created on Saparua now hangs on Villa’s façade. The silhouette of a palm tree floats high above the street, a few meters behind the flag, where the leaves of a Dutch oak complement it. The green contrasts with the red textile work. Nazif has brought the Moluccan palm leaves here, showing that his work is not only personal but also addresses the deeper history of the Netherlands, presenting images that do not immediately explain themselves but draw viewers in—artworks as Trojan horses.

“The Dutch society can continue to deny colonization, but that no longer works: the Dutch state is built on colonization. You can’t distance yourself from that. History is extremely personal, but I think people in the diaspora connect with the translations I create. For example, artist Kwabena Sekyi Appiah-Nti recognized the shells I used in another work and told me how important they are in Ghanaian culture. That’s significant; my work is increasingly about finding a place or not belonging, and trying to heal that for yourself. I try to capture all those pieces of history in something as small as a palm leaf.”