Moelyono's art invites dialog on social issues

By R. Fadjri

YOGYAKARTA (JP): One hundred and fifty yellow coconuts piled in five neat heaps on the floor of the Bentang Gallery form an elongated square. A plastic straw pokes out of an opening in one coconut on the lower rung. Light from a bulb above the display completes the scene.

Moelyono's installation art is featured in the Tumpengan Kelapa exhibition at this Yogyakarta gallery through the end of the month.

The walls of the gallery are adorned with drawings of coconuts, straws and scribblings about the concept of the pieces. Pencil drawings have been made directly onto the walls.

Another smaller room, measuring 5x5 meters, is occupied by a four meter high and two meter wide cylindrical bamboo construction. The outer section is covered with piled coconuts, imparting a cramped feeling. Four oil lamps are suspended from the walls.

The first installation piece conjures up an image of heads piled up in rows. The shape of coconuts do resemble human heads, and the Indonesian word for coconut, kelapa, is sometimes confused with that for head, kepala. The straw in the one coconut provides a disconcerting impression of a head with its contents about to be imbibed.

A discussion of this piece may center around its seeming portrayal of the dulling processes of a heterogeneous system. This rigid and all-encompassing structure forces people within it to conform to its definitions.

Most of Moelyono's works are conceptual art. A graduate of the Indonesian Arts Institute, he always tries to picture his ideas in visuals, focussing on social phenomena based on particular social theories. Theoretical narration can be found at the base of his works.

Moelyono's art contains the realistic art form. "In the realistic art form, the public is pictured as a culture creating subject. They are not passive consumers of culture," he wrote in his book Seni Rupa Penyadaran (Realistic Art Form). This collection of his writings was launched at the Bentang Gallery exhibition.

Moelyono believes there is potential for the public to use this type of art as a medium of dialog. This form if fully developed, could provide people at the grassroots level with a means to express their aspirations of independence, justice and democracy.

"It aims to improve one's lot and one's rights through the art of creation," said Moelyono, who just finished the Current Art in Southeast Asia exhibition in Japan. In his opinion, the realistic art form stresses creative art values as a supportive attitude and complicity with people on the lower rungs of the social ladder.

His expression of realism arose when he associated with members of non-governmental organizations and student activists during university.

Moelyono chose to return to his hometown, Tulungagung, in East Java, after receiving his bachelor of arts degree.

In 1988, Moelyono held a workshop with children from a hamlet on the southern coast of Tulungagung. The children were freed from the rote pattern of learning usually foisted upon Indonesian students.

Instead of drawing traditional subjects of mountains, roads and landscapes, the children were encouraged to depict people, atmospheres or everyday happenings.

Pictures were drawn with a marker on rough paper, or in the sand at the beach with a twig. Later the work was colored with cheap food colors. This group of children were liberated from a stereotyped form of expression and their work reflected their social experiences. There were interesting results. One child graphically showed the upheaval in his family after their ricefield was converted into a public swimming pool.

Social problems

Output of nearly four years was collected in drawings, graphics and sculptures which served as documentation through art of the community's social problems.

Moelyono later expanded his activities to the labor community in Rungkut, Surabaya. He invited the workers to develop their creative potential through the arts as a respite from the drudgery of work.

"Workers basically like to master the arts to express themselves," Moelyono said. The right to be involved in arts is a form of cultural democracy. Since factories are profit oriented concerns, workers' right to participate in art was given no attention.

Moelyono says cigarette company Sampoerna, which has a marching band of its workers, appears more interested in the commercial aspect of the enterprise. "It is not an expression of art on the behalf of the workers."

Despite rejection at first, Moelyono managed to awaken the workers' creativity. Paper drawings done in ballpoint and created in stages depict the working atmosphere in factories.

On Aug. 12, 1993, Moelyono organized an exhibition by a group of factory workers entitled Pameran Seni Rupa Untuk Marsinah (An Art Exhibition for Marsinah) in commemoration of the 100th day of the murder of the labor activist in Surabaya. The authorities banned the exhibition. Marsinah's murderers are still at large.

As an artist of concepts, Moelyono's art does not point out the elementary processes, nor the intricate procedure of materials. His concept of art does not stress the elementary form but goes beyond it.

"The realization of art does not depend on the subject of art. The contents of conceptual art can be found in the resulting action and reflection of practicing real life art," he said, adding that concepts of art aim to invite dialog among those who care about life's problems.

Moelyono's work is often influenced by concepts of indigenous art movements. These movements use natural materials growing in certain regions, which are processed into works of art. An example is the coconuts, which grow in abundance in Tulungagung.

Although Moelyono may be considered in step with contemporary art trends, the emotionally complex and testing nature of his work is no doubt too disturbing for many members of the Indonesian public.