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In Jakarta, 30 artists engage 255 children from neighborhoods affected by rising water levels. Together, they paint a monumental mural in a submerged area to highlight the city’s sinking.
ThinkCity
For 30 years, Jakarta has been sinking. The causes: over-extraction of groundwater, massive urbanization, and rising sea levels due to climate change. Jakarta is sinking, the sea is rising: without drastic measures, 25% of the megacity’s area, home to 30 million people, will be completely submerged by 2050.
Standing in water among floating debris, tens of thousands of residents from the northern parts of the city are already forced to abandon everything to be relocated elsewhere.
The NGO GK Indonesia works with displaced populations who leave behind jobs, schools, neighborhood ties… The NGO strives to build a viable ecosystem for their future, helping them find new jobs, supporting children’s education, and establishing connections between communities.
of Jakarta’s area at risk of being submerged by 2050
engaged artists
children involved
With Metis, a group of artists, associations, and individuals have come together to implement an ambitious project. The goal? To help vulnerable populations in the northern districts of Jakarta, most affected by the city’s sinking, and to widely raise awareness about the situation.
In collaboration with the NGO GK, the ThinkCity initiative engages the street artist collective Gardu House. Over the course of a weekend, 30 artists join forces with the people of the Muara Baru and Marunda districts for a “punchy” event. Standing in water, they paint monumental murals on the walls of threatened infrastructures, in a submerged area that has become uninhabitable.
For six months, art workshops focused on environmental education are offered to the residents. Dance, music, painting are used to invite them to express themselves and discuss the issue of rising water levels. By giving a voice to populations who rarely have the chance to speak out, this event, widely covered by the media, highlighted their reality and attracted the attention of political decision-makers.
An intense moment of sharing between the artists and the residents, the project provided a real platform for expression for those living daily with increasingly severe floods. The videos produced by Hadua Production were widely broadcasted. Without underestimating the severity of the phenomenon, the artwork conveys a message of hope and resilience.