Writing in the rain

A name is a very personal form of identity. FX Harsono was given a Chinese name, Oh Hung Bun, in Hokkien dialect (Hu Feng Wen in Mandarin) by his parents who were Chinese Indonesians. He used it until the age of 18 years old when it was taken away in 1967. That year an Indonesian government regulation was established determining that ‘authentic’ Indonesian names were to be used, rather than ‘unnationalistic’ Chinese names which had negative connotations associated with them. Hence Franciscus became his baptised Catholic name provided by his mother and he found the Harsono surname for himself. In this installation work, Harsono remembers the erasure of his name, which he repeatedly writes in Chinese characters using black ink, and which are constantly washed away by the rain.