Edith Bons was born in Indonesia, in the city of Merauke, West-Papua (Irian Jaya). However she grew up in The Netherlands. Graduated from the Academie voor Beeldende Kunsten en Vormgeving Minerva, Groningen, The Netherlands, and is active as visual artist since 1985.

In her art, Edith Bons deliberately seeks to express her bicultural roots and living environment, the so-called Indische Identiteit, or Dutch-Indies (read Indonesian) identity. The Poleng motif, occurs many times in her art, is a dualistic symbol of many contrasts: black and white, good and bad, East and West etc. It is striking that poleng in Balinese culture is a symbol of balance of the universe.

Characteristic of Edith Bons’ art is also her use of many elements from traditional Indonesian artefacts, and organic materials such as palm and banana leaves, reed, rattan, wood, but more importantly rice seeds. As the main staple of many people of the East, rice has important meanings to which many symbolisms are assigned. Edith Bons creates several art installations consisting of rice as their main material or subject.

Tekst: Sander Salim (Galerie Lukisan, Bergen op Zoom)