Kobarweng or Where Is Your Helicopter?

Kobarweng or Where Is Your Helicopter? (1992) is a short documentary directed by Johan Grimonprez that deals with the history of a remote village in the highlands of New Guinea. The videotape assembles archival footage and oral histories depicting the first encounter between the Irian Jaya people and the scientific crew, including anthropologists, of the Dutch Star Mountains Expedition.[1] The confrontation with the crew and their helicopter caused a shock that threw the worldview of the villagers upside down.[2]

The event even entered their Sibil-tongue language; literally translated, "weng" means language, whilst "kobar" airplane.[3] Kobarweng's title is an ironic reference to a question first posed to Grimonprez by a local man named Kaiang Tapor, who, upon Grimonprez's arrival in the village of Pepera after a three-day hike, asked him where his helicopter was. The footage in the film is traversed by a running band of script, reporting observations and remarks culled from anthropologists' interviews, eye-witness reports, and the reminiscences of those highlanders who recall those moments of 'first contact' between the white intruders (missionaries, prospectors, anthropologists, adventurers) and the local inhabitants: "We never tell everything, we always keep something for the next anthropologist" they are candid enough to admit to Margaret Mead, while another wit remarks: "We called the whites 'people of soap', but their shit smelled the same as ours."[4]

Switching the roles of observer and observed, the relation implied in the anthropological representation is reversed: the desire of the observing anthropologist itself becomes “other”, “exotic”, an object of curiosity destabilised by the villagers' questions.[5] According to Grimonprez: "Kobarweng critically considers the myth of objectivity, the pretence of an epistemic and scientific detachment maintained not just by the anthropologist, but throughout the discourse of western science, where the observer finds himself caught in an alienated position of transcendence over his/her subject."[6]

It Will Be All Right If You Come Again, Only Next Time Don't Bring Any Gear, Except a Tea Kettle...

In 1994, Grimonprez showcased a five-channel installation entitled It Will Be All Right If You Come Again, Only Next Time Don't Bring Any Gear, Except a Tea Kettle..., which expanded upon the themes of Kobarweng. The encounter between the different groups in 1939 up to the current problems caused by neocolonialism.

Papua New Guinea is one of the most heterogeneous countries in the world[7] and has long been a favorite among anthropologists, with its more than 7000 years of agriculture, its hundreds of tribes and languages, some of whom have still not been "discovered".[4] Beside a cultural-rich area, Western New Guinea is also an area with considerable reserves of gold, copper, uranium, nickel, oil and natural gas which causes environmental degradation and ongoing series of human abuses.[8] An estimated 100.000 people have died in the region since Indonesia took control.[9] According to a Yale university law school report "there can be little doubt that the Indonesian government has engaged in a systematic pattern of acts that has resulted in harm to a substantial part of the indigenous population of West Papua."[10] Amnesty International found that there were no effective means for people of the public could complain against the police acting in violation of international law and standards.[11]

Critical reception

The film was acquired by the museum collections housed at the Musée National d'Art Moderne, Centre Georges Pompidou; the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, and Tate Modern. The film was awarded the Grand Prix de Ville de Genève - First prize at the SIV Video Biennale Saint-Gervais Genève in 1993;[12] the First prize for the best international video creation at the Cadiz International Video Festival 1994; as well as winner for the category 'experimental documentary' at the Baltimore Film forum 1992.

Director

Johan Grimonprez is a Belgian multimedia artist, filmmaker, and curator. He is well known for his films dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y (1997) and Double Take (2009). As of 2014, Grimonprez's upcoming projects include the feature films How to Rewind Your Dog (2014) and Shadow World: Inside the Global Arms Trade (2015), based on the book by Andrew Feinstein and was awarded a production grant from the Sundance Institute. In 2011 Hatje Cantz published a reader on his work titled Johan Grimonprez: "It's a Poor Sort of Memory that Only Works Backwards",[13] with contributions by Jodi Dean, Thomas Elsaesser, Tom McCarthy (novelist), Hans Ulrich Obrist, and Slavoj Žižek. The filmproject Kobarweng or Where is Your Helicopter? (1992), was completed during Johan Grimonprez's study at the School of Visual Arts (New York), while attending the Independent study program at the Whitney Museum.[14]

Further reading
  • Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes Its Object.[15]
  • Other People's Anthropologies: Ethnographic Practice on the Margins[16]
  • Het witte hart van Nieuw-Guinea, met de Nederlandse expeditie naar het Sterrengebergte[17]
  • First Contact: New Guinea's Highlanders Encounter the Outside World[18]
  • Like People You See in a Dream: First Contact in Six Papuan Societies[19]
  • West-Papua, plunder in paradise. Anti-Slavery International[20]
  • A Cargo Movement in the Eastern Central Highlands of New Guinea[21]
  • West Papua: The Obliteration Of A People[22]
  • Oh, What a Blow That Phantom Gave Me![23]
  • Ok Tedi: The pot of gold[24]
  • Ok Tedi", in Neuguinea: Nutzung und Deutung der Umwelt[25]
  • A Small Footnote to the "Big Walk": Environment and Change among the Miyanmin of Papua New Guinea[26]
  • "Zij en wij"[27]
  • Flying MacArthur to victory[28]
  • The trumpet shall sound; a study of "cargo" cults in Melanesia[29]
  • Videofilm: Anthropology on Trial[30]
  • Videofilms VPRO - Andere tijden (2004)[31]

See also

References
  1. "Kobarweng or Where is Your Helicopter". LIMA. Retrieved January 14, 2014.
  2. Brongersma & Venema, L.D. & G.F. (1962). To the Mountains of the Stars. New York: Doubleday.
  3. Hylkema, S (1974). Mannen in het draagnet, mens- en wereldbeeld van de Nalum Sterrengebergte. 'S-Gravenhage: Martinus Nijhoff. ISBN 978-90-247-1622-7.
  4. Elsaesser, Thomas (October 2013). "Johan Grimonprez Kobarweng or Where is Your Helicopter?". Neuer Berliner Kunstverein - Kobarweng.
  5. "Open Archive #2 - Kobarweng or Where is Your Helicopter?". Retrieved 2014-05-17.
  6. Grimonprez & Asselberghs, J. & H. (1998). "Kobarweng or Where is Your Helicopter". Johan Grimonprez: "We Must be over the Rainbow!. Centro Galego Arte COntemporanea: 85–6.
  7. "Papua New Guinea". The World Factbook. Central Intelligence Agency. Retrieved 2014-05-17.
  8. "Freeport McMoRan's Corporate Profile". May 19, 1997. Retrieved February 19, 2014.
  9. "Statement by archbishop Desmond Tutu, South Afrikca" (PDF). Indonesian Human Rights Abuses in West Papua: Application of the Law of Genocide to the History of Indonesian Control. Allard K. Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic Yale Law School. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 25, 2013. Retrieved February 23, 2004.
  10. "Indonesian Human Rights Abuses in West Papua: Application of the Law of Genocide to the History of Indonesian Control" (PDF). Allard K. Lowenstein International Human Rights Clinic Yale Law School. April 2004. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2013-08-25.
  11. "Document - Papua New Guinea: Violence against women, sorcery-related killings and forced evictions: Amnesty International Submission to the UN Universal Periodic Review". May 2011.
  12. Asselberghs, Herman (November 13–14, 1993). "Video van Johan Grimonprez over Nieuw-Guinea bekroond". De Standaard.
  13. Grimonprez, Johan (August 31, 2011). It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards (PDF). Hatje Cantz. ISBN 9783775731300.
  14. Taylor & Grimonprez & Ayoung & Ekeh, Simon & Johan & Todd & Onome (1994). It will be all right if you come again, only next time don't bring any gear, except a tea kettle... Palais des Beaux-Arts.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  15. Fabian, Johannes (April 15, 2002). Time and the Other: How Anthropology Makes Its Object. Columbia University Press. p. 205. ISBN 0231125771.
  16. Zwier, Gerrit Jan (2008). Other People's Anthropologies: Ethnographic Practice on the Margins. Berghahn. p. 123. ISBN 9781845453985.
  17. Brongersma & Venema, L.D. & G.F. (1960). Het witte hart van Nieuw-Guinea, met de Nederlandse expeditie naar het Sterrengebergte. Scheltens & Giltay. p. 281.
  18. Connolly & Anderson, Bob & Robin (August 3, 1987). First Contact: New Guinea's Highlanders Encounter the Outside World. Viking Adult. pp. 336. ISBN 0670801674.
  19. Schieffelin & Crittenden, Edward L. & Robert (January 1, 1991). Like People You See in a Dream: First Contact in Six Papuan Societies. Stanford University Press. p. 328. ISBN 0804718997.
  20. Anti-Slavery Society (September 1990). West-Papua, plunder in paradise. Anti-Slavery International. p. 100. ISBN 0900918209.
  21. Berndt, R.M. (1952). "A Cargo Movement in the Eastern Central Highlands of New Guinea". Oceania. 1. 23: 40–65. doi:10.1002/j.1834-4461.1952.tb00567.x.
  22. Budiardjo, C. (1988). West Papua: The Obliteration Of A People. Tapol. p. 142. ISBN 0950675156.
  23. Carpenter, Edmund (1974). Oh, What a Blow That Phantom Gave Me!. Holt, Rinehart and Winston. p. 192. ISBN 0030068819.
  24. Jackson, Richard Thomas (1982). Ok Tedi: The pot of gold. University of Papua New Guinea. p. 199. ASIN B0007BF0JI.
  25. Michel, T. (1987). "Filim, Yamsep. Ok Tedi", in Neuguinea: Nutzung und Deutung der Umwelt". Museum für Völkerkunde: 381–93.
  26. Morren, G.E.B. (1981). "A Small Footnote to the 'Big walk': Environment and Change among the Miyanmin of Papua New Guinea". Oceania. 1. 52: 39–65. doi:10.1002/j.1834-4461.1981.tb01484.x.
  27. Pouwer, J. (1959). "Zij en wij". Hollandia: Nieuw Guinea Koerier. 1 (194).
  28. Rhoades, W.E. (1987). Flying MacArthur to victory. Texas A&M University press. ISBN 9780890962664.
  29. Worsley, P. (1968). The trumpet shall sound; a study of "cargo" cults in Melanesia. New York: Schocken Books. p. 392. ISBN 0586080295.
  30. Gullahorn-Holecek, B. (November 1, 1983). {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help); Missing or empty |title= (help)
  31. "1961: Nederland maakt propagandafilms over Nieuw-Guinea". VPRO.
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