Mangu paints love for nature

Yusuf Susilo Hartono, Contributor, Jakarta

Fishermen walk in rows on the coast in the morning. An elderly woman selling fish waits for buyers at the seaside. There are fish with hooks in their mouths. There are women engaged in sand quarrying. Then there is the expanse of the Serangan coast.

These are the objects that can be observed in paintings by Balinese Anak Agung Mangu Putra, a graduate of the School of Fine Art and Design from the Indonesian Institute of Art (ISI) in Yogyakarta, all displayed under the theme Muttering of Water Land and Stone in a solo exhibition at Santi Gallery, Kemang, Jakarta.

This exhibition is the last for Santi Gallery as the owner has sold it.

Compared with Mangu's other exhibitions, held at other places and generally focusing on fish as the object, the ongoing exhibition seems to suggest that the contemplation of his surroundings has broadened.

In his note on the exhibition catalog, art observer Agus Dermawan T says, "Mangu Putra's latest works no longer reflect his (social) restlessness through an obvious visual language. He seems to be only wishing to mutter or whisper something through his expressive, but thematically more gentle, drawing of water, land, human beings, fish and stone."

Mangu has also shown a change in attitude to fish as his theme. While previously fish were presented visually as objects full of slicing and blood to express his protest against man's cruelty towards nature, now he draws fish as the blessing that nature bestows on human beings.

Take a look at his painting titled Berkah II (Blessing II). It features three fish in three panels, each measuring 145 centimeters (cm) by 70 cm, made of acrylic on canvas. Although the hooks are still in the mouths of the fish, the animals do not show any sign of pain in the picture. Then the eyes of the fish show resignation and conviction that their death is beneficial to human beings.

The peak achievement of Mangu's fish period is his painting,Imajinasi Bawah Laut (Undersea Imagination), which depicts the migration of a school of fish with steel scales. In 1994 this painting came first in the Philip Morris Art Awards painting contest.

Mangu is highly skilled at painting techniques and possesses a deep esthetic sensitivity, as manifested in his texture exploration, shape drawing, detail exploration and the play of the pallet knife to bring about thickness and thinness as well as dark and bright shades. In short, his works are pleasing on the eye.

It is not surprising, therefore, that collectors are now vying to buy the paintings at the ongoing exhibition, which were all produced in 2002 and come in large sizes. Before the exhibition was opened, at least 10 collectors were vying with each another to buy one of his paintings. The winner was finally determined in a draw on Sunday, July 14, the opening day of the exhibition.

The outstanding strength of his textural exploration is found in his work titled Penambang Pasir III (Sand Quarrying People III). Stones, bluish and brownish yellow, in the foreground and background of two women working hard to carry sand on their heads, feel terribly cold. Yet these stones have their own restlessness behind their robust appearance under the sunshine and the lapse of time. In Penambang Pasir I (Sand Quarrying People I), texture is played with the drama of three women trickling with perspiration while cracked brownish stones hang above their heads.

In these two paintings, the women are depicted impressively in silhouette, just with brownish-black faces without details of eyes, noses and mouths.

Silhouette drawing of a group is found in Pada Suatu Subuh (At One Dawn), where he depicts a group of people walking barefoot on an expanse of brownish sand. They cross their arms on their chests to keep themselves warmer against the morning cold. In the background a man wearing a broad-rimmed hat carries a basket of fish on his head. In the spaces between their legs and heads, there is an extent of brownish- and bluish-white, playing with dark corners, a metaphor of the dark life the fishermen are leading.

If we also observe his Tanam Padi (Rice Planting), which relies on silhouette with the accent of light on the clothes and the water in the rice field, and the play of rhythm, tone and profundity, we come to the conclusion that these works are far stronger than Adu Nyali (Contest of Guts), which seeks to depict the perfection of children competing with one another by jumping into a waterfall.

This minor flaw notwithstanding, Mangu Putra, in this solo exhibition, wishes to whisper to all of us to (again) love nature.

The exhibition runs from July 14 through to July 31 at Santi Gallery, Jl. Benda No. 4, Kemang, South Jakarta, tel. 7806079