Srihadi strives for esthetic perfection

Amir Sidharta, Contributor, Jakarta

Fetching hundreds of millions of rupiah, Srihadi's paintings of Legong or Bedoyo Dancers and the Borobudur have become must-have items for collectors of Indonesian art. At an auction in Jakarta last March, his Borobudur painting fetched an astounding price of one billion rupiah.

"There is power in the silence of Srihadi's paintings. That is what strikes me the most about the painting," said a collector who was seen bidding aggressively.

Indeed, there is a solemn, meditative and even transcendental quality in his work.

One day, a woman came up to Srihadi Soedarsono, thanking him for providing her husband with spiritual guidance through his work. The previous year she and her husband had purchased a painting at Srihadi's exhibition at the National Gallery in Jakarta. At the time, her husband was engrossed with acquiring material gains through his various businesses. Yet, after they had purchased the painting, he would sit down and gaze at its majestic qualities. The painting touched his soul, reminding him about the omnipotence of God, and how small he was in his presence.

The painting changed him. He started to pray regularly and paid greater attention to humanity. It is this kind of spiritual quality that Srihadi attempts to achieve through his work, whether it be of an ancient Buddhist temple on Java, a Hindu Pura on Bali, or Javanese and even Balinese dancers.

Even his most garish paintings are executed with his signature austere use of hues and scrupulous aesthetics. Srihadi would depict the dynamism of a Pendet dance, for example, in a minimalist composition of forms consisting of two or three main hues. The mood and vibrancy of the dance is evoked not through the use of diagonals and wild brushstrokes, but rather through a careful choice of a combination of colors. Even the most opulent of Srihadi's paintings contains a certain quietude which mirrors the artist's own character. The soft-spoken man is careful in his choice of words and gentle in conduct.

The quiet artist keeps within him a great deal of history. Srihadi was born into an aristocratic family of the Surakarta court in Surakarta, Central Java in 1931. Since he was very young, his grandfather -- a court kris maker and guardian -- taught him Javanese customs, culture, history and myths. His parents were producers of the Laar brand of batik, and at their workshop young Srihadi learned not only about batik motifs and their symbolism, but also the techniques of the dyeing process.

But it was not until after the Japanese surrendered and the eventual independence of the Republic of Indonesia that Srihadi started to pursue art professionally.

As a member of the Indonesian Student's Association, he worked on designing and producing patriotic posters and banners. Later, he was assigned to the information department of the People's Security Force, where he enlisted primarily to design posters. Yet, there he was given another challenging assignment -- to record events through his sketches.

Soerono, an older artist who was boarding at Srihadi's home, introduced him to Soedjojono, the founder of the first Indonesian artists' association, Persagi. Following independence, Sudjojono set up the Young Indonesian Artists' Association in Madiun and often visited Surakarta where he worked with Soerono and other members of the group at the Centrum Theater. Srihadi joined the group and adopted their communal style of drawing, learning primarily from Soerono.

Srihadi's developed his skills in charcoal drawing as a documentary artist during the Revolutionary War from 1945 to 1949. Although most of his drawings from this period were destroyed when the Army Information building was burned down during the Second Dutch Military Action in 1948, he did manage to keep some.

Not only did Srihadi serve his country as an artist, he also risked his life acting as a courier for the Indonesian freedom fighters, transporting weapons. One unfortunate morning in 1949, he was caught red-handed with two grenades in his pockets by Dutch soldiers. He was beaten and taken prisoner.

However, his art spared him, as he charmed his captors with his sketches. He was offered a chance to attend school in Semarang while remaining in Dutch custody and he was later released and transported back to Surakarta.

Even before finishing high school, he had decided he would continue his studies in art to become a painter. After graduating in 1952 and weighing out the political inclination of Yogyakarta's Indonesian Fine Arts Academy against the solid, systematic curriculum of the art department of Bandung Technology Institute (ITB), he enrolled in Bandung.

There, Ries Mulder, an art educator who worked in the manner of Analytical Cubism, became an influential figure, affecting the work of Sadali, But Mochtar, Mochtar Apin, as well as Srihadi. It was Mulder's strong influence that led critic Trisno Soemardjo to label Bandung as the "laboratory of the West". Noticing Srihadi's stylistic shift, at the 1955 Asia-Africa conference in Bandung, Sudjojono harshly criticized him. Although Sudjojono seemed bitter, Srihadi recognized that the criticism from the legendary pioneer of Indonesian art was not meant as a personal attack but rather as constructive advice.

Srihadi completed his studies in Bandung in 1958, and was immediately offered a teaching position, which he gladly accepted. Political tension over the fate of West Papua or Irian Jaya, which had started the previous year, had reached a peak. Dutch citizens still residing in Indonesia, which included Ries Mulder, were expelled from the country.

Meanwhile, Srihadi obtained a scholarship from the American government and enrolled at the Ohio State University in Columbus. The year was 1960, and New York was surpassing Paris as the world's center of contemporary art. While Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism was popular, Srihadi did not blindly adopt them. He was more interested in learning the creative processes American artists underwent rather than the end product. Here, he started to develop his personal artistic fundamentals, which, among others, incorporates the Javanese concept of rasa (taste). The artist received his master's degree in 1962, and returned home just when students in the United States were repatriated as political tension between the two countries escalated.

He returned to a turbulent Indonesia and continued to teach art at ITB. The following year, he married Siti Farida Nawawi, and started his family.

In 1970 Srihadi was offered a teaching position at the newly set up Jakarta Arts Institute. The next year he received the Anugrah Seni, the country's prestigious Art Award, for his accomplishments, including having participated at the Sao Paolo Biennial in 1969 and creating a sculpture for the Indonesian Pavilion at the World Exposition in Osaka in 1970.

Not long thereafter, he was appointed chairman at both institutes. During this time his works contained sharp criticism, which he subtly wrapped in a cloak of vibrant albeit somber oil colors applied onto the canvas with expressive painterly brushstrokes. Only a few realized the strength of his statements and the meanings of his metaphors at the time.

However, not all were subtle commentaries of social change during that time. At the inaugural exhibition of the Taman Mini Indonesia Indah in East Jakarta in 1974, Srihadi presented a painting showing Jakarta's famous water fountain in the southwest corner of the National Square, with a background of buildings embellished with advertisement billboards. To the amazement of the invitees, Jakarta's respected governor Ali Sadikin defaced the painting in anger when he saw it, criticizing the work and saying it advertised Japanese products.

At the end of that year, the Indonesian art scene witnessed young art students protest the choice of paintings selected for the Grand Exhibition of Indonesian Art, an incident that became known as Black December in Indonesian art history. The avant- garde New Art Movement, propagated by a group of artists younger than Srihadi, emerged the following year.

Rest assured that artists from the younger generation were already following his lead in making sociopolitical statements through their art, he began to paint images more contemplative in nature and more refined in execution. From the mid-1970s onwards, Srihadi focused on nonpolitical subjects, namely landscapes and dancers.

The artist himself considers that his paintings from this period onwards were more "manifestations of the spiritual essence" rather than "physical impressions of the subjects". Art critic Jean Couteau, who wrote the recently launched definitive volume on the artist and his work, Srihadi Soedarsono: The Path of the Soul, divided Srihadi's paintings into two categories: cosmic works and figure paintings, both in the vein of "his quest for union with the Divine".

Over the decades, Srihadi's paintings have undergone several transformations both in artistic form and philosophical content. Landscapes and figures are among his favorite subjects in recent years. Few realize these are subject matters that have obsessed him since his formative years. He paints them over and over again to this very day, striving for his own aesthetic perfection and a perfect spiritual union with God Almighty.

It is his perseverance in his search for spiritual transcendence through aesthetic perfection that has afforded him the recognition of being the most prominent living Indonesian artist today. The recent publication of the book on the artist written by critic Jean Couteau reaffirms this recognition.