O Grecele is an exhibition initiated by the Juanga Culture group that consists of young people from North Maluku and Broken Pitch, a collective of young Yogyakarta artists. The two groups also displayed their works at Biennale Jogja XVI Equator #6 2021’s main exhibition and also held the Boki Emiria Show as one of their productions that’s affiliated with the biennial art event. The O Grecele exhibition also presents a simple marketplace which they call “Nuku Mart”.
For me, visiting this exhibition is an interesting event in itself. Looking back at the geopolitical map before the birth of the idea of the nation-state, we can see the close kinship between the Tidore people and several Papuan communities, especially in the bird’s head area to the Saireri waters.
It is said that after being eliminated from the political arena in his country, Prince Nuku left to live on the west coast of Papua Island, possibly in the Onin Peninsula, or present-day Fak-Fak. His kinship with the people in the Bird’s Head region of Papua had seemingly been forged for quite some time.
In Dit Wenderlijk Werk’s book, F. Ch. Kamma wrote, “In 1649 when the VOC was at war with Tidore, a fleet of 24 boats came to Tidore with food supplies. The small ships came from the islands of Irian to help the King of Tidore under the command of a man named Kurabesi.”
Kurabesi was a title that the ruler of the bird’s head region had held for generations.
Sultan Nuku is a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad SAW who was named and titled Saidul Djehad Muhammad El Mabus Amiruddin Sjah Kaitjil Paparangan Jou Barakati. Sultan Nuku has never been defeated in his life. He’s the only Sultan in the archipelago who during his life always won his battles, both at sea and on land.
In May 1796, Nuku, who had consolidated his troops during his expulsion in Papua, carried out an attack on Tidore which was then led by Sultan Kamaludin, whom Nuku has deemed to overstepped on Nuku’s rightful throne. After the attack, Nuku proclaimed himself the King of Tidore.
Nuku then carried out another historic attack in 1801, an event which Adnan Amal in his book Kepulauan Rempah described epically as an attack that cornered the colonial rulers, such that in the next dynamic, they officially recognized Nuku and Tidore as independent kingdoms, separate from the Dutch.
Not many people know that among the soldiers who fought alongside Nuku from areas such as East Halmahera and Patani, there were also soldiers from Papua.
Muridan Widjojo in the Nuku Rebellion said that a Tidore Sultan (the name of the sultan is not confirmed) officiated the marriage of his daughter, Boki Tabai, to Sekfamneri (sometimes referred to as Kurabesi). Their descendants are part of the current residents of Kolano Fat, which is now Raja Ampat.
This long relationship bequeathed several terms in Tidore which were adopted as clan names in Papua, such as ‘Kolano’ which was a position in the sultanate strata in the Moluku Kie Raha region, now the Korano clan in the Biak society. ‘Kimalaha’ became Dimara, and also ‘Sangaji’ which underwent phonetical correspondence and became Sanadi.
This relationship continued in the future. It is said that in the mid-18th century, about 40 years after Nuku’s death, the Muslim Sultan of Tidore ordered the ships of Tidore’s troops to accompany two men named Carl Wilhelm Ottow and Johann Gottlob Geissler. On February 5, 1855, they anchored off the coast of Mansinam Island, Papua. An event that is commemorated every year as a big day for the Papuan people: the day when Gospel entered the land.
In the next century, the name Emiria Soenassa emerged, who on several occasions practiced healthcare as a nurse in the same area that Nuku went to, her ancestor when he left. However, the story is not as famous as her journey as an artist. Yes, Emiria Soenassa is named the first female modern painter in Indonesia.
As a descendant of the Sultan, Boki Emiria is also a descendant of the Prophet Muhammad with the title Syarifah, obtained from her father, Sultan Al Alam Syah.
On Sunday evening (7/11), the new generation of Tidore children gathered and celebrated their predecessors. Perhaps one of the things that made this exhibition interesting was that among the works of young artists exhibited there, one of Emiria Soenassa’s works was also present. The work, which is a private collection of the famous artist Nasirun, was brought by the collector who also opened the exhibition.
When Nasirun was about to put the work in the space provided as a sign that the exhibition had opened, several young people burst into tears. The woman who is widely called Emiria Soenassa is still a Boki Emiria for the people of Tidore. Their Princess.
