Born in 1960 in Emmeloord, The Netherlands, Mella Jaarsma studied at Art Academy Minerva in Groningen and then pursued studies at the Art Institute of Jakarta and the Institut Seni Indonesia. Based in Yogyakarta, Jaarsma’s artistic practice challenges any simplistic categorisation as her background situates her in a unique perspective, slipping in and out of the tensions of her environment. Her costume installations use various materials that are charged with metaphoric potencies of race, identity, human nature, sexuality, beliefs, politics and origins.The concept of the hijab symbolises a ‘second skin’, covering all but the eyes and ankles that remain visible, to see and be seen. Here, she uses squirrel skins sewn together to make visible the contradictions in humanity by exposing the savagery and mercilessness in how human beings have exploited animals to satisfy our insatiable needs with scant regard for the possible extinction of species.
