“We Just Always
Try to be Blind” reflects on how war and oppression can also destroy people,
not only disease or a pandemic. The work is inspired by the event in Rohingya,
Myanmar. In the work we can see a few prisoners on the verge of execution,
inspired by an image Nugroho saw in the mass media, of ten people tied and consequently
executed, according to the news. This particular image represents the way in
which we, the outsiders, relate to this event – although it happens in front of
us, we try to close our eyes when watching it; the eyes of the world are also
open but always looking in a different direction. The work is a form of
personal protest and anxiety towards this event. There is something
fundamentally wrong in exiling people from their homes because of identity or
religion. An alternative solution to hate or oppression is open dialog and
finding alternative ways to coexist. For Nugroho, The human intellect is not
only capable of violence but also of finding alternative solutions to hate or
oppression through open dialog and harmonious ways of coexisting.