The Walter Spies Foundation (Stichting Walter Spies Holland) was founded on 28 October 1983 in Leiden at the instigation of Hans Rhodius who was its first chairman. In 1981 Rhodius was also responsible for the foundation of the Yayasan Walter Spies Bali whose purpose was essentially to provide financial support for Balinese dancers, choreographers, musicians, and composers.

The decision which led to the Foundation in the Netherlands was triggered by the generous gift through the intermediary of Rhodius by Mrs Daisy Kölling-Spies (1905-2000) of an extensive collection of letters written by Walter, her elder brother, essentially to their mother, and also to other members of the family. The letters date from September 1915, when Walter Spies (b. Moscow 1895) was interned in Russia, to May 1940, when he was again interned in the Netherlands East Indies. Of special interest for the Indonesian studies are the letters written from October 1923, the time of the artist’s arrival in Java. His letters, distinguished by a gift of sharp observation and lively literary style, account of his many artistic and scholarly interests in Java, and in Bali where he settled permanently in 1927 until his internment in May 1940 due to his German citizenship, first in Java, then in Sumatra. When he was evacuated by ship to Ceylon (Sri Lanka), his ship was hit on 19 January 1942 by a Japanese bomb. Walter Spies was not among the survivors.

Hans Rhodius ( Antwerp 1 January 1912-Heemstede 2 May 1988) visited Indonesia in 1939 and although he missed the opportunity to meet Walter Spies personally, he saw some of his paintings in an exhibition in Batavia (Jakarta). Struck by their strange and fascinating beauty, Rhodius gradually conceived the idea of preserving the painter’s life and works in a book of memoirs for future generations. The idea was reinforced when, in 1950, he was able to acquire his first painting by Spies. He then started upon a long itinerary in the quest of the artistic and scholarly legacy of the painter, musician, photographer and researcher, seeking contact with family members, friends and those who would share their testimonies with him, almost all around the world.

The aims of the Foundation from 1983 on were not different from those Hans Rhodius had privately followed for more than thirty years. They were to establish a collection of paintings, letters, photographs by Walter Spies, to collect literature about the artist and to make this available for study purposes, to grant financial support to students of the arts of Indonesia who have a particular interest in the work of Walter Spies, to sponsor exhibitions and performances of work by Walter Spies or by artists working in the same fields as he did, namely in the visual arts, music and dance. Such artists were expected to demonstrate a blend of Eastern and Western elements in their work and so continue the impulse to cross cultural understanding exhibited by Walter Spies.