Rina Kartika

I try to visualize what also ‘exchanged’ on the famous trade route, Spice Route. Some believe the hospitality custom of local Indonesian people (Ternate) by that time made the route establishment possible, including the prosperity growth of the port cities along the route. On the contrary, the other called that hospitality a naiveness, and it triggers the west countries’ imperialism in South East Asia. Although it is a debatable part of the history, one thing for sure that the trade route not just for goods exchange, but it also an information (knowledge) route of that time, that build ‘melting pots’ along the route, and unleash more possibilities for related people, cities, and also the countries, than other.
Does The Route still beneficially for the related cities and countries in this IoT era nowadays? How about in the future? Will it still deliver advantageously added values for them or others?
My artwork presents the original vehicle of the Spice Route with its tangible load (the spices) and intangible load (knowledge and information, such as culture, custom, wisdom, religion, art, even politics, and fairy tales). And also the original route map, to demonstrate the huge knowledge that one could gather on that period along the Spice Route.