Photo gallery offers promising talents
By Samsudin Berlian
JAKARTA (JP): Promoted as the first journalistic photo gallery in the country, Galeri Foto Jurnalistik Antara shows promise of great things to come through its current exhibit.
The gallery, owned by the Antara News Agency, is nestled amidst bustling stores at the entrance gate of the Pasar Baru shopping complex in Central Jakarta. The modest gallery occupies the ground floor of the Graha Bhakti Antara building on Jalan Antara 59, which also houses the Antara Museum.
Originally opened two years ago, the gallery has only sprung to life recently, after Antara asked Etnodata, a company specializing in cultural promotion, to manage it in January this year. Etnodata assigned as curator Yudhi Soerjoatmodjo, a young and energetic photojournalist.
Yudhi, 30, studied photography at the Parsons School of Design in Paris and at the School of Photo Documentary in Newport, Wales. His experiences include a period of time as a photographer with Jakarta Jakarta magazine and a photo editor with Tempo newsweekly.
Currently, he is also teaching at the IKJ Jakarta Arts Institute and is an editor of Matra magazine.
Gloom
As soon as he was put in charge, Yudhi listed a series of activities -- exhibits, workshops, seminars, lectures -- to be scheduled until the end of next year. Bimonthly lectures on works of world photographers are already being held regularly.
Yudhi chose eight youths in January to be trained in a three- month workshop on journalistic photography. The selected works of the group of eight are being exhibited until June 29, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
The works show how the youths -- six university students, one university graduate and one high school student -- share their views of "Old Jakarta" through photography.
Almost all of the 28 works on display reveal the gloom that hangs over Jakarta's old buildings as they await their demise in the ever renewing metropolis.
In most of the photos, the people are insignificant. The ruins seem to cry out in silence over the neglect they suffer while the city's residence busy themselves elsewhere.
The four black-and-white photos of Nur Wahyonno, 22, a PR student at the IISIP Political and Social Sciences Institute, depict the neglect and continued deterioration of Taman Prasasti Park in the Tanah Abang area, which was a cemetery at the time of the Dutch Indies.
His Penguburan (Burying) shows wild vegetation growing at the feet of a beheaded guardian angel statue. The head of the statue lies nearby on the ground. A shovel rests beside the statue. The title suggests that the statue will soon be buried.
Nur complements his photos with an explanation that the 1.2 hectare park was formerly part of the 5.5 hectare Kebon Jahe Kober public cemetery. The area was supposed to be preserved through a previous renovation, but on it now stand the buildings of the Central Jakarta mayoralty and the National Sports Committee.
"I chose this as the subject of my photos because I found unexplainable ... [divine] communication there," Nur told The Jakarta Post.
Hary Subastian, 26, a graduate of IISIP's School of Social Sciences, displays three black-and-white photos portraying old buildings in downtown Kota. His Di Pinggir Jalan (At the Roadside) shows a solitary, old food vendor in front of a row of closed two-story wooden shop houses facing an empty street. Part of the wooden wall is covered with lichen. The scene is depressing, yet Hary said: "I want to cultivate beauty through things that are old."
Evelyn Pritt, 16, the youngest of the group and the only woman, interprets "old" primarily in the sense of "decay." She uses color photos to capture the dark and shadowy ruins of a neglected house in Pulomas area. Her Rumah Tua (Old House) displays the silhouette of the ruins at sunset.
Zalchairi, 20, a photography student at IKJ, said he was obsessed with the old, neglected houses in the Kwitang and Cikini areas in Central Jakarta.
In Wanita Tua, Gedung Tua dan Gedung Megah (Old Woman, Old Building and Majestic Building) he contrasts the three elements, seemingly to protest the partiality of fate.
His more artistic piece Gedung Tua dan Pohon Mati (Old Building and Dead Tree) frames dead branches in the dilapidated window of a wall in ruins.
Umar Widodo, 22, also an IKJ photography student, tries to find life in a dead building. His Kodok (Frog) shows an amphibian resting in a damp hole at the crumbling base of a house in Jalan Salemba, Central Jakarta.
Gibran Galeb, 20, a tourism student at the Trisakti Tourism Academy, zooms in on old professions rather than buildings in North Jakarta.
However, the people in his works are as insignificant as those in other photos. They are a just trivial element in the machinery called development. In Kuli dan Peti-peti Kemas (Dock Worker and Containers) a small kuli (port worker) walks in front of a double row of massive containers.
Handri Ramdhani, 20, currently studying communications at the University of Indonesia, is the only one in the group besides Evelyn to use color photos. His photos contain nothing "old." He does not focus on specific objects, but lets the images in the photos -- a bystander's face, part of a taxi, segments of words from a store, a lizard on a wall, a tree -- all speak for themselves of their struggles in the city.
Indra Prapurna, 25, a public relations student at IISIP, presents the inside story of the Kota railway station. Hidup (Alive) and Mati (Dead), two pictures in one frame, show a small plant in a vase under a window.
In Hidup, taken in February, the plant is healthy and freshly watered. In Mati, taken a month later, it lies on its side, its leaves -- still green -- touch the ground, and a doormat cover its roots.
The melancholy undertone of all the works is no doubt the message intentionally conveyed by the photographers, who Yudhi has encouraged to share their perceptions.
The photos try to speak to the viewers. That is what Yudhi, as one of the workshop trainers, wants photography to do. "Photography should be a functional language that tells the viewers what the photographers experience," he said.
"Now they have a tool with which they can express themselves, their happiness, their sadness, their protests," he said about his pupils, adding that this goal is what makes the workshop different from other training courses, which only offer a way to make money.
He seems to have been successful in influencing them as several of them said they would prefer to be photojournalists rather than professional photographers.