Edhi Sunarso: From a child guerrilla to a sculptor

Edhi Sunarso: From a child guerrilla to a sculptor

Singgir Kartana, Contributor, Yogyakarta

For Edhi Sunarso, being either a guerrilla or a sculptor needs a
strong spirit. The spirit of nationalism that was forged when he
was a guerrilla and the spirit of an artist jointly make him a
leading creator of monuments and statues that Indonesia take
pride in.

Born in Salatiga, Central Java, on July 2, 1933, Sunarso has
an impressive reputation as a sculptor. His works include the
Welcome Statue at the Hotel Indonesia traffic circle, the West
Irian Liberation Statue, the Aerospace Statue, the Yogya Returns
Statue, the National Monument, the Youth Monument in Semarang,
the Lubang Buaya Monument, the Bali Puputan Monument, to name but
a few. He is a monumental presence in the history of Indonesian
sculpture.

He said he was proud of being able to translate other people's
ideas into sculpture form.

"Many of the monuments started as ideas suggested by first
president Sukarno," he said.

The Welcome Statue was made in 1959 and is now associated with
the capital. The sketch of this statue was made by former Jakarta
governor, Henk Ngantung, who had done a lot to provide Jakarta
with parks.

In 1961, Sunarso was involved in making the West Irian
Liberation Statue at Banteng Square, Central Jakarta, and in 1963
he participated in the making of the Aerospace Statue in
Pancoran, South Jakarta. In later years, he was always involved
in the building of important monuments in Jakarta and elsewhere.

Sunarso's life has been full of struggle. When in elementary
school, he lived separately from his parents.

"I even forgot my mother's name," he said.

In 1946, during the revolutionary era, he joined the
Children's Troops and served as a guerrilla courier in several
places like Subang, Pamanukan, Cimalaya and Purwakarta, supplying
ammunition to his seniors. At 12, he was arrested and while in
prison he learned art and English.

After leaving prison, he intended to join his former unit,
then already moving toward Yogyakarta. He walked there from
Bandung but in Yogyakarta he got interested in art and simply
abandoned the guerillas, even though he was a sergeant major.

Although he started with painting, he later chose sculpture as
his profession. In 1952, when he was at the Indonesian Fine Art
Academy (ASRI) in Yogyakarta, he began to study sculpture
seriously.

"Thanks to Hendra Gunawan, who was then teaching in ASRI, I
was accepted as a listener at the academy," he said.

As he got more and more interested in learning art, he tried
many ways to get accepted as an ordinary student and finally was
accepted. After completing his studies there with excellent
results, he got a scholarship from UNESCO to study sculpture in
the Khalibaban faculty of the Kala Bhavana Visna Bharati
University, Shantiniketan, India, for three years.

Sunarso made the right choice. In his first solo exhibition in
Calcutta, India, in 1956, he was named the best sculptor. A year
later, in the All-India Exhibition, he grabbed three gold medals
for sculpture, graphic art and as best exhibitor.

As a guerrilla turned sculptor, the spirit of nationalism,
consistency and honesty are reflected in his statues. His
experiences during the revolutionary years affected his sculpting
style: expressive and realistic.

When creating monuments, his revolutionary spirit comes out
expressively and realistically without refinement. In his more
personal creations, though, he becomes contemplative and makes
use of symbols.

A human figure, for example, is depicted as having a small
head to stress, he said, that the head is the center of human
existence. In his monuments, he expresses the collective spirit
of the nation while in his more personal works he deals with
humanitarian esthetics that go beyond national borders.

Sunarso also creates deformed statues, for example the
sculpture of a hungry person with large legs, eyes open wide and
the buttock turned up, an expression of hunger, anger, pain and
so forth. He did not realize that this style was part of modern
art until his work The Anonymous Political Prisoner won a prize
in an international modern sculpture competition in London in
1953. Thanks to this prize, he could travel round Europe.

In 1955, he got married to Kustiyah, a marriage that has
produced four children: Rosa, Ira, Satya and Sari. All the
children are also engaged in art as interior and visual
designers.

Sunarso said the most impressive work for him is the Unknown
Fighter Statue in Digul as when making it, he could express his
feelings fully.

Besides sculpting, Sunarso also paints. In his house, at Jl.
Kaliurang Km 5.5 No. 72, Yogyakarta, dozens of paintings
depicting wooden, stone, resin and metal statues are hung in his
sitting room. His paintings are also hung at his Hasta Kreativa
Studio on Jl. Gajah Road, Umbulharjo.

Compared to other art genres, sculpture enjoys less
appreciation in our society. Galleries rarely exhibit sculptures.
Sunarso agreed, adding that few critics of sculpture were found
in Indonesia. The reason was that it usually took a long time to
make sculpture and that the materials were expensive. As a
result, few are interested in buying sculptures

"I don't think we've got an established sculpture critic. We
have only a few observers. They do not criticize but only
describe what sculpting art is all about," he said.

Still, he maintains his optimism that sculpture as art will
receive greater attention in the future, especially with the
establishment of the Yogyakarta-based Indonesian Association of
Sculptors.

"This association is expected to spur sculpture in Indonesia,"
he said.

Sunarso has several awards to his credit, among others the Art
Award from the Indonesian government in 1982, an award from the
Calcutta Fine Art Academy and a gold medal from the Indian
government in 1957. In 1959 he joined the teaching faculty at
ASRI and a year later was asked to head the sculpture department.
He retired from ASRI in 1997. Today he manages his sculpture
workshop and teaches in the post-graduate program at ISI
Yogyakarta.