`Tempo' photojournalists exhibit work at Antara gallery

`Tempo' photojournalists exhibit work at Antara gallery

By Amir Sidharta

JAKARTA (JP): Works by four Tempo photographers are currently
on exhibit at the Antara Photojournalistic Gallery in Pasar Baru,
Central Jakarta.

The photographs were originally prepared for a traveling
exhibit commemorating the 20th anniversary of Tempo in 1991, but,
due to organizational problems, were never shown. Ironically, the
June press bans that led to the closure of Tempo instigated
gallery curator Yudhi Soeryoatmodjo to recover them and set up a
modest exhibition of the color photographs.

The photographers each focus on a particular region in
Indonesia. Hidayat S. Gautama presents a photo essay of Jakarta
Kota's train station, Rully Kesuma questions the sprawl of a
Chinese "gravetown" in Cikadut, Robin Ong records the celebration
of Cap Go Meh and the daily life of Chinese descendants around
Pontianak, while Donny Metri portrays life in the remote Baliem
Valley of Irian Jaya.

Hidayat S. Gautama's photographs of the Jakarta Kota station
were taken in response to rumors that the impressive Deco-esque
station was going to be demolished like Gambir Station.

"Gambir meant a lot to me and my family. It symbolized arrival
in Jakarta, not only to myself, but also to my elders," Hidayat,
who is better known as Dayat, remarked. Therefore, he wanted to
photograph the Kota station as a way "to preserve the memories
that once existed there" before they were "lost and no longer
retrievable."

Photographically investigating the Kota station, Dayat
discovered the essence of the train station beyond its
fascinating architectural features. He tried to portray the
notion of transition and movement. This he places in relation to
the entity of the station, that is, its architecture. One
photograph shows two men sitting and waiting, seen through an
intricate turn of the century grill. They are in a temporary,
stationary state. A figure with a bag, sitting on the base of a
steel column, is contrasted with a glimpse of the grand hall of
the station through which many people move. Amongst the crowd, a
woman, also carrying a bag, balances the composition. Both the
bags, and the contrast between the sitting figures and the
swiftness of the woman enhance the notion of movement.

To fully understand the train station, Dayat went out of his
way to investigate the least public of spaces. His third
photograph shows trains on the station's tracks, viewed through a
window. The scene is not from any generic space. The red and
green flags rolled and placed by the window specify that the view
is from the control tower. The juxtaposition of the control
tower, the "brains" of the station, and the trains on the tracks,
the "guts" of the station, expresses another significant aspect
of the railway station.

Celestial

Starting with a fragmented image of a coffin, in front of
which is placed offerings, Rully Kesuma places the existence of a
Chinese cemetery in Cikadut, near Bandung, at the focal point of
his work.

The second image is a shot of the ornate architectural details
of a structure in the cemetery which diverts our attention from
the grim aspect of decay associated with graveyards. Instead, it
leads the viewer to a notion of celestial deliverance. Then, an
image of an abandoned gravestone is also captured. It stands
crooked amidst tall coarse grass while a water buffalo lurks
behind. Through this rather humorous photograph, we are reminded
again of decay.

The final two images of Rully's work places the cemetery in a
broader context. One shot shows a guard standing nonchalantly in
front of the gate leading to two ornately embellished circular
structures joined together, resembling a double royal umbrella,
the details of which appear in a previous photograph. In the
other photograph, clothes are placed on the posts of the
cemetery's fence. Beyond the fence is an empty lot bordering the
main area of the cemetery. The images "presents a reality between
the dead and the ones that are still alive," states the
interpretive label.

Cap Go Meh

During an assignment to cover the fight between boxers Elyas
Pical and Raul Diaz in Pontianak, in 1988 sport photographer
Robin Ong decided to cover the Cap Go Meh celebrations at the
same time. Despite the predominantly Chinese population of the
town, permits for public Chinese holiday festivities were not
issued. Therefore, the celebrations were limited to the Chinese
temples and small villages outside of town.

In a temple in Pontianak, Robin captured a fortune teller in
action. Playing a central role in deciphering future auspices, he
is surrounded by lingering onlookers. Another photograph taken in
the vicinity of the temple portrays the suffering of a dancer
torturing himself as a gesture of repentance.

The image symbolizes the hardship endured by the Chinese
around Pontianak. In the villages, boys celebrate by dancing the
barongsai dragon, which they have assembled using scrap material.
There, the ethnic Chinese live in shanties. Many of the people's
immigration status is unclear and they tend to shy away from
photographers. Hence, Robin had to use a 300mm lens coupled with
a 2x converter, to capture images of the daily life of the
Chinese, offering an alternative to the stereotyped perception of
Indonesian Chinese.

Human interaction

Donny Metri's images of the Dani of Irian Jaya's Baliem Valley
captures glimpses of human interaction around Wamena. Three of
his five photographs were taken during a blessing of a church in
Hitigima. Two Dani men intimately share the light of a cigarette.
Their facial expressions show a sincere appreciation of the
deadly smoke. Amidst the smoke of their potlatch, Dani men
cooperate in a stone roasting "bakar batu" ceremony. Meanwhile,
waiting for the food to be ready, a child sleeps in his mother's
embrace.

Donny's two other photographs depict men in their
surroundings, one urban, the other rural. A Dani man, clothed
merely in a long holim penis sheath, stands in front of an
amenities store at Wamena's Nayak central market eating boiled
corn on the cob. Through this juxtaposition, a banal occurrence
at that particular marketplace, the photographer shows a bizarre
collision of modern urban merchandise in remote rural settings.
The final image portrays a lone man, carrying a log on his
shoulder, on his way home to one of the villages in the valley.
His figure seems to be diminishing, perhaps even dissolving, into
the mountainous landscape.

The works presented in the show, most of which are
uncommissioned photo essays composed as "by-products" of assigned
work, represent the relentless investigative spirit of the four
Tempo photojournalists. The exhibition will last through Sept.
20.