Time to keep wary eye on art treasures

Time to keep wary eye on art treasures

By Astri Wright

VICTORIA, Canada (JP): The emphasis in Indonesian media and
art exhibitions in the last few years was on emerging painters.
Young men and women who 10 years ago would have had a terribly
hard time gaining access to mounting solo exhibitions in smaller
galleries were invited to hold large shows in the nation's most
established galleries.

In the wake of the art boom that began around 1990, the
numbers of would-be artists, ranging from more to less talented,
soared.

Competition was ignited by stories of sudden successes, like
unknown young artists winning major international art awards. In
such a busy and congested scene, perspectives of art history and
esthetics were often forgotten or ignored.

Pricing of artworks became arbitrary, based on greed and
ignorance. Amid all the new debuts, senior artists, the
pathbreakers of past historical eras, at times were lost from the
larger picture.

Prices soared out of sight both for the lucky few among the
new artists, whose art or personality hit a media nerve, and for
those fortunate senior or historical painters who still captured
the collecting public's interest.

With the economic downturn in Indonesia over the last six
months, the art boom -- already slowing down over the past two
years -- is over. At least for the time being.

This seems to be the case from the perspective of most
Indonesian collectors. But the situation also invites important
questions.

As a culture critic and art observer, I recommend keeping a
very close eye on what is painted, sculpted, performed and
written in the country now and in the months to come.

It has been documented in many times and places that modern
artists often produce their best work during personally and
socially challenging times.

During wartime, with its military and civilian struggle, in
periods of political oppression, hunger and economic crisis, the
insincere artists fall away. Good-luck hunters seek opportunities
in other, more immediately lucrative areas.

The making of high-quality art demands a nonmaterialistic
attitude as the basic starting point. During difficult times,
only those artists who are obsessed with their need for artistic
expression continue to work.

Commodity

Since such artists are filters through which the deepest
spirit of their historical moment manifests itself, their art
increases in intensity.

If local collectors are not buying art at present, will modern
Indonesian art now revert to being a commodity collected mostly
by outsiders, as it was during the colonial period and the first
three decades after independence?

Will the significant works produced by artists in this time
of general suffering and increased national tension be brought
out of the country, perhaps even before they are documented
photographically? Will they be lost before they can become part
of the record of modern Indonesian art history and of individual
artist's careers?

Or will foreign speculators be able to buy up the art cheaply,
hoard it and wait for the moment when the market has stabilized
again, to sell the works to the highest bidder?

Furthermore, with public and private budgets disintegrating
throughout the country and massive unemployment, what will happen
to the security around already established art collections?

If art theft was already a problem in the last two years, what
will happen to the national, municipal and provincial government
collections of art, not to speak of significant large private art
collections in Java and Bali?

The questions about the fate of modern Indonesian art, in
regard to its aesthetic development and its marketability, at
home and abroad, are linked to the questions of the national
economy as a whole, particularly the urban economy.

I urge art collectors and art lovers with resources left after
the family's provisions have been secured to think seriously
about how it may be paramount to take special steps to protect
the national artistic heritage at this time.

Examine for yourself the role art has played in the
archipelago's culture since ancient times, the role modern art
and literature played in the nationalist struggle for
independence, and the role art has played since independence in
forming the nation.

Art has been paramount in reflecting and shaping its complex
and fascinating identity, and forever representing the country
and its people on domestic and international fronts.

This should not be the moment when, carefully and anxiously
guarding the granary, you forget to safeguard the ancestral
shrine where all your pusaka, those inherited cultural treasures
both old and new, are stored.

Astri Wright is an associate professor of art history, B.C.
Canada, and author of Soul, Spirit and Mountain: Preoccupations
of Contemporary Indonesian Painters (Oxford University Press,
1994).