Verantwoording
2
PREFACE
This book describes the life of Eduard Cuypers, Marius Hulswit, the people around them and their projects in the Dutch East Indies, where they worked in both Amsterdam and Jakarta. The choice was made for a story with a chronological structure, which takes place alternatively in the Netherlands or in the Dutch East Indies. The architects have left a very small archive which makes a thorough investigation into their work difficult. Thanks to the internet, digitised archives, a few interviews with relatives, visits to Indonesia and the discovery of part of the archive of Fermont-Cuypers, it was possible to reconstruct their story in broad lines. Many of their buildings in Indonesia are still there, despite all the changes there. After the death of Eduard Cuypers, the agency in Jakarta continued under the name Fermont-Cuypers.1 That name unintentionally led to confusion, because it seemed as if Eduard Cuypers, even after his death, still had buildings in his name. The office in Amsterdam continued after the death of the founder under the name Eduard Cuypers, which led to similar misunderstandings. The period 1927-1957, in which the architecture firm in Jakarta, ‘Fermont-Cuypers’ was called, is covered in another book entitled: Architecture from the Indonesian past.
For whom This book contains facts of which in the Netherlands there is little or no knowledge, even though they belong to Dutch architectural history. That gives this book its raison d’être. This book is necessary because it informs the population of Indonesia about buildings that are still in use and whose backgrounds they do not know. I have used present-day geographical names, including Jakarta (Batavia, Djakarta) and Bogor (Buitenzorg), but I do speak of the Dutch East Indies.2 This book shows that the buildings that the Dutch left behind in Indonesia are often very worthwhile. Many Dutch architects have now made their name in Asia. This book shows how their predecessors worked there in a different time and under different conditions. This book is necessary because this topic remained unspoken, partly because the colonial situation overshadowed this past. This book describes the creation of buildings, which were ini-
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tially intended for western companies and agencies, but which are now in use by Indonesian companies. These now occupy their buildings with pride. This book is also meant for them. This book is for everyone who is interested in Eduard Cuypers, Marius Hulswit, Arthur Fermont, their architecture firms and the work they left behind.
Method Biographies of many fellow contemporaries of Eduard Cuypers have appeared in the Netherlands. Books have been published about his colleagues and his former employees who became well-known architects.3 Yet, little was known about Cuypers himself. Calls for a thorough study have so far not been heard.4 I had to identify and interpret most sources and archives in the Netherlands and Indonesia by myself. The meetings with the people in Indonesia confirmed my suspicion that my research was based on a eurocentric approach.5 There is no getting away from it, I am not an Indonesian. The people I describe were not either. They were foreigners in a country where they had or thought they had a mission.6 The Dutch writer Hella Haasse wrote; ‘I was born in the Dutch East Indies [...] and yet, I was nothing more than a stranger’.7 I have not visited all the projects that I describe here. That is partly due to the long distances that have to be covered. During the life of Hulswit and Cuypers, those distances were no less so. It was logistically a huge task to get anything done. Add to this the scarcity of western building materials and skilled craftsmen in the Dutch East Indies. All in all, there is sufficient reason to judge the work done in the Dutch Indies differently to the work done in Europe.
Sources Books about Eduard Cuypers do not exist, let alone about Marius Hulswit. A thesis was published in 1979 about Eduard Cuypers.8 This work was, together with a few inventory lists, the basis from which I worked.9 This was also the only source for the small group of people who have worked in the Netherlands on publications about pre-war architecture in the Dutch East Indies, so that the inaccuracies in the thesis regularly reappeared.10 Even
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