Satya Graha explores a fourth dimension in art

By Margaret Agusta

JAKARTA (JP): A rare and rich display of the possibilities of pencil as a medium of expression is on display 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily through June 4 at Lontar Gallery, Jl. Utan Kayu 68H, in East Jakarta.

Satya Graha is a graduate of the Fine Arts Department of the Bandung Institute of Technology who furthered his interest in art in Germany for several years. He beckons viewers to enter a "fourth dimension" of space and perception in this exhibition of 34 detailed and creative drawings. This highly skilled artist, who initially focused on sculpture, using pencil sketches only as planning tools, first became aware that drawing could be an art form in its own right when he met Juergen Schilling, a German artist who specialized in that method of artistic creation, during a six-month visit to Germany in 1978.

This chance meeting with Schilling and the opportunity to view several exhibitions of drawings in Germany, as well as exposure to the works and ideas of British-born painter Francis Bacon around the same time, opened up a new world of artistic concepts and techniques for the young sculptor. He returned to Indonesia and finished his studies in sculpture at the institute in 1980.

He then returned to Germany, where he began creating sculptures from wood in a small room which doubled as his home and studio. The lack of space was prohibitive to the creation of large works of art, with the sawdust shavings from the wood almost impossible to get out of the carpet, so Satya began recording his ideas for sculptures with pencil on paper in notes and sketches for use at a later time in a larger space.

Yet, as he sketched, he became increasingly aware that he could achieve intensely interesting effects through exploration of the myriad possibilities of space, texture and composition on paper. This deeper acquaintance with pencil, eraser and paper as media in relation to his concepts about sculpture also motivated a shift in his perception of creative expression.

"Initially, I sketched plans for monumental and massive sculptures," Satya Graha said in a recent interview with Asikin Hasan, a curator at Lontar Gallery. "Then I began to want to draw something that was more like mankind, who are not massive, nor eternal; mankind with all their problems and bodies, which can be wounded or destroyed. With this in mind, I now always try to see just how far I can go with a simple pencil, just how many specific effects I can achieve in a work in relation to space, texture and other things."

New dimension

This new preoccupation with the fragility and transience of humankind not only led the young artist into a continuing and increasingly in-depth exploration of drawing as creative expression, but motivated him to research and rethink the concepts of a number of artists, such as Bacon, Swiss sculptor Alberto Giacometti and French sculptor Aguste Rodin.

Satya was intrigued by Bacon's principle that a work of art should not be experienced through the mind, rational thinking or storytelling, but had to be comprehended and felt directly through the raw nerve of human existence. He was also impressed by Bacon's ability to capture the essence of mankind's fragility and impermanence through the exploration of the use of runny paint and large brushes.

Satya then tried to apply these concepts in his own work by approaching his subjects more emotionally and exploiting the marks of pencil and eraser on paper to create a feeling of the space and depth that can emerge from even the simplest movement of a human figure.

With this exploration, Satya took his first tentative steps into a "fourth dimension", which he entered through the manipulation of space, the concept of movement through time and the perception of man as an ephemeral being. He continued this artistic journey through the exploration of Giacometti's preoccupation by depicting human figures as he perceived humankind and the human existence.

He thoroughly examined Giacometti's tendency to elongate the human form into branch-like textured sculptures, and Giacometti's idea that each work of art he created must be pushed to its very limits. Satya then drew the conclusion that Giacometti was actually attempting to depict the entire human condition in each of his works, rather than simply individual human figures.

"I came to the conclusion that Giacometti was picturing the fragility that at one time or another all human beings must acknowledge," Satya wrote in the exhibition catalog. "If the human form is depicted as massive, it becomes monumental and gives the impression of being eternal. And this is exactly the opposite of the essence of humankind. I am not really certain that Giacometti took his thinking that far, but I somehow have come to the conclusion that is what he was trying to say."

His exploration of the works and thinking of Rodin pushed him further into this new dimension with the awareness of the difference between the outside appearance of man and the essence of human existence. Satya concluded that even Rodin did not create sculptures that were precise depictions of what he saw with his eyes, but rather renditions or interpretations of the human form. In his opinion, Rodin approached the human figure as unified fragments that created a specific image.

Journal

From all of this, Satya came to view the creation of art as a kind of record, a journal of daily events. His drawings became an analysis of man in relation to the dimensions of time, space and the inner workings of his own mind; an apparent mapping out of the "fourth dimension" emerging from his own creative exploration as an artist.

"... among the most impressive of my experiences in Germany, I recorded as if in a diary," Satya explained. "For example, the time I met some workers on their way home from the factory. It was winter at the time, and they were riding the subway with their pale faces partially hidden behind thick scarves. And behind those pale faces; it seemed that I could look through, into their bodies as if they were transparent. It was as if I could see their bones behind their skin.

Then I realized that this is the essence of man as he is now. The essence of modern man: Working hard to make a living in a big city, ground down by the cycle of time dictated by industry... That is what I initially attempted to sketch. And that has developed into the kind of drawing with pencil that I am doing now."

He discovered the "fourth dimension" of art through the linking up of the techniques of drawing and the concepts of sculpture with the awareness that the manipulation of space through the marks of a pencil and an eraser on a blank sheet of paper allows for the analysis of man's movement through time and of the inherent transience of human existence. He cuts straight through to the nerve center of human perception by peeling away the outer layers of human appearance and setting forth teasing visual inquiries about man's position in space and time.

"I see the human figure as a construction of bones, skin, muscle, and veins which give the appearance of pulsing with life, but which are shadowed by impermanence," he said. "I just hope that this is not viewed as the only quality or value apparent in my work. What I mean is that I am certain that each work of art has a great many aspects, which might not even be suspected by the artist himself; things that are expressed intuitively, which then expand into any number of issues."

Works

In works like Punggung T, Kepada T.M. (T's Back, For T.M), Satya peels away the outer layer of skin and cuts into the muscular structure of the figure to create a sense of vulnerability and the ephemeral quality of life. He also sets forth an intriguing visual dilemma in which he creates a compelling impression of the presence of negative space between the torso and the arm of the figure without actually leaving blank white paper showing through. This creates a visual tension in which the viewer almost expects the figure to move within the next second or two, with the arm lifting away from the body in a natural motion.

A similar sense of impending movement through space and time exists in the three works titled Berjalan (Walking), in which the figures appear static, yet somehow propelled forward in the same instance. And in the works titled Penari Bali (Balinese Dancer), Tari Topeng (Mask Dance) and Tari Kipas (Fan Dance), Satya Graha takes this tantalizing analysis of the potential for movement in the living body even further with shadowy, wavy pencil lines, which delude the eye into perceiving movement of hands or legs.

Yet the artist does not end his analysis of man's movement through time and the impermanence of human existence with the exploration of the movement of the human figure through space, he expands the idea to include the perception of the changes wrought by time to create a sense of being and yet no longer being in a specific space and time.

In the work titled Tamu (Guest), Satya presents an even more puzzling visual impression of transience, in which the figure at times appears to be superimposed over the architectural structure of the room in which it sits, while at other times the edges of doors or windows seem the emerge through the figure as if, in fact, only the ghost or the memory of the "guest" remained within the depicted space.

"I am intrigued by living human beings and their problems," he explained. " And recently I have also become interested in the city environment and landscapes. And in film I have become extremely interested in the ideas of Andrey Tarkovsky, who focuses on ordinary objects in the water or at the edge of the road. These images depict the fact that man had once been in a given place.

"Its just like a fragment (of existence). The people have gone, but something still remains. I try to perceive what it is that has been left behind and to capture that. (The idea that) there, in that place, someone once lived and moved, as is reflected in my drawing titled Tamu. Someone had come..., a human being had sat and thought there."

The artist then marries this concept of the impact of time and space on the existence of humankind with the idea of stripping a figure to its essence in search of the internal human experience of an individual with his portraits of past artists and writers who have had an impact on him through their creations. Study Beckett (Study of Beckett), in particular, conveys a strong sense of the intellectual power of this great thinker and playwright. His studies of Rembrandt and Bacon are equally impressive in that they convey a strong impression of the personality and import of the individuals pictured.

In this exhibition of 34 complex drawings, Satya Graha introduces viewers to images that deal not only with the myriad technical aspects of his chosen media, the mechanical aspects of sophisticated manipulation of space and the clever use of texture, but also with the condition of humankind, in particular, modern man, whose questioning of his own existence haunts everything said and done in these times. It is in this way that Satya Graha introduces us into the "fourth dimension" of art, which is the result of the bringing together of impressive artistic skill and profound human insight.