Siti Andalusia – The estate and art collection of Jacob Vredenbregt

Siti Andalusia – The estate and art collection of Jacob Vredenbregt
Ca. 106 pagina’s, ongenummerd
Jaar: 1991
Taal: Engels
Afmeting: 21,50 x 30,50 cm
ISBN: niet van toepassing, privatly published

Siti Andalusia – The estate and art collection of Jacob Vredenbregt

For by far the greater part of my life I have slept under a roof that
was not my own.
During the second worldwar, during the time Nazi Germany occupied the Netherlands, the country where I lived and was born, it was a matter of survival never to be too long at the same place
Afterwards I became a soldier, was a prisoner of wat, an university student, a planter, again an university student, and I ended as an anthropologist.
It was not the life that rewards one with a pernanent roof that one might call one’s own, but it gave me something else in return : a wealth of experience, friendship and the perception of cultural versatility and beauty.
Most of my life I have spent in southeast Asia and the starry sky has often been more common to me than the roofing tiles.
Even in later period when I became an university professor my life style did not fundamentally change
And then suddenly when one notices that the body can no longer live up to the still youthful mind, the need to settle is born with a simultaneous desire to surround oneself with these objects d’art that are an aesthetical reflection of the experiences and perceptions of previous times
This, in a nutshell, is the philosophical starting-point of my home that lies at the border of south Jakarta close to the road that leads to Bogor.
I named it after my two daughters Siti Mariam and Andalusia Mariam
and called the house ‘Siti Andalusia’.
The art collection it contains is eclectic and probably not very valuable but it appeals to my aestethic sentiments and I feel closely to it
I always bought those objects that genuinely pleased me and every acquisition was a happening, an aesthetic adventure indeed
The collection consists of both European and Asian art, both old and modern paintings, both the refinement of Chinese porcelain and earthware and the provoking force and beauty of what, unfortunately, is often labelled ‘primitive art’
The overall picture one perceives (I believe) is that of harmony, a consequence of the fundamentally similar sentiments shared by mankind irrespective of cultural origin
Of this special value, I as the resident of Siti Andalusia’, anthropologist, and author, am continually reminded
JACOB VREDENBREGT
@ Siti Andalusia