Yogyakarta a hotbed for artistic talent

Yogyakarta a hotbed for artistic talent

By R. Fadjri

YOGYAKARTA (JP): The passage of time can soften the most rigid
of opinions.

A magazine recently published a photograph of painter Hardi in
front of his work, Jendralnya Jendral (The General of Generals),
clearly an admiring portrait of President Soeharto, the nation's
ruler for 30 years.

What a contrast to October 1979, when Hardi showed his
impatience for a new leader in Kandidat President Tahun 2001
(Presidential Candidate for 2001).

This was a montage of 21 photographs of himself dressed in a
general's uniform bedecked with medals, the same attire of
Soeharto in Jendralnya Jendral.

Both works have political slants, but the ways in which they
are conveyed make a world of difference.

The graduate of the Indonesian Fine Arts Academy (ASRI) in
this city may get money for Jendralnya Jendral, but Kandidat
President Tahun 2001 merely led to police questioning.

Hardi's generation of artists is defined by its political
awareness, and many of their works are vehicles of social
protest.

In perhaps their most notorious act of rebellion, they bucked
the modern fine arts establishment during the biennial art show
at Taman Ismail Marzuki in 1974, a politically charged year.

In a statement called Black December, Unlimited Discourse, 13
signatories derided the artworks in the exhibition as decorative,
consumerist pieces. They urged a relaxing of the boundaries of
modernism in art to embrace experimental works.

Several ASRI Yogyakarta students, including F.X. Harsono,
Bonyong Munie Ardhie, Ris Purwana and Sity Adiyati, were actively
involved, both in creating the concept and organizing
exhibitions, in what became known as the New Fine Arts Movement.

Acceptance of their aims was not always forthcoming. ASRI
director Abas Alibasyah expelled four students who signed the
statement and dismissed a lecturer who defended them.

In Yogyakarta, many students supported the movement.
Exhibitions were organized despite threats of sanctions. Agus T.
Goenawan, one exhibition participant, was expelled from ASRI.

These repressive measures did not stop students from arranging
exhibitions and discussions on their belief that rigid
compartmentalization of the arts was outdated.

Efforts to block them were not limited to the campus
administration. Police closed the exhibition Seni Kepribadian Apa
(What is Art's Identity?) at Galeri Seni Sono in Yogyakarta on
Sept. 1, 1977 after it had been open for two days.

ASRI students -- including such famous names today as realist
painter Dedi Eri Supriya, art critic Gendut Riyanto and Sawung
Jabo -- composed the most participants in the show, a daring
collaboration of fine arts, music, literature and "happening"
art.

Even the exhibition's title was a parody of the concept of
Kepribadian Nasional, or national identity, which was a
compulsory component in cultural expression at the time.

But the movement's thesis of antiuniversalism and its
championing of the validity of experimental art as a medium of
expression gave birth to an antithesis -- commercial art -- which
peaked in the 1980s with a boom in painting.

Of course, not all ASRI students were swept away by the
current of commercialization. Commercial art itself resulted in
an antithesis which was experimental in nature.

ASRI students of the 1980s inherited the ideas of the New Fine
Arts Movement, including the openness to contemporary fine arts.
Heri Dono, Dadang Christanto, Eddy Hara and Nindityo Adipurnomo
emerged in the mid 1980s. Contact with European and American
artists brought them to an international arena.

Their enthusiasm was supported by the establishment of a small
gallery, Galeri Cemeti, in 1986 as an exhibition venue for young
artists, who ordinarily would not have the funding to show their
works. They emphatically rejected the modernist fine arts of
Widayat, Fadjar Sidik, Nyoman Gunarsa and other ASRI teachers.

But experimental works had no place at official arts events
like the Yogyakarta Painting Biennial and the Yogyakarta Arts
Festival. Frustration at this alienation reached its peak during
the third painting biennial in Yogyakarta in 1992.

Dadang Christanto invited many young professional artists from
the fine arts, music and theater to arrange a rival exhibition.
They gave it the sarcastic title Binal Experimental Arts, binal
being Indonesian for rebellious or wild.

"The binal exhibition was not a form of expression of people
with a grudge, but instead it indicated an awareness of pluralism
in arts and celebrated differences," Dadang said.

The exhibition lived up to its name. Students hung their
paintings on the ceiling of a railway station, or performed in
train cars. Heri Dono showed his Kuda Binal (Wild Horse) in the
northern square of the Yogyakarta palace.

Sculptor Hedy Haryanto displayed Teror Produk (Product of
Terror) -- the facade of a house covered in product wrapping
paper -- in a densely populated area. Eddy Hara changed his home
into an exhibition hall.

Dadang and Harry Wahyu displayed their installation work in
the Seni Sono building which was about to be demolished, in
conjunction with an experimental music show by Joseph Purba.

Perhaps due to the slight political content of the exhibition,
no artists were called in by the police. Even the organizers of
the biennial exhibition appreciated the show. Not surprisingly,
mixed media and installation arts were accommodated along with
the painting biennial two years later.

The binal activists have gone international today.

Heri Dono holds exhibitions abroad at least four or five times
a year, as do Dadang Christanto and Eddy Hara. All three are
often invited abroad and they spend most of their time preparing
works.

This has been to the detriment of the art discourse.

What developed on the arts front was conventional and tended
to be decorative in a naive or expressive style. Young artists
like Faizal, Erica and Bunga Jeruk, inspired by the naive themes
of Eddy Hara, emerged.

The expressive style is characteristic of paintings by Entang
Wiharso and Nasirun. Before their 30th birthdays, they obtained
extraordinary material success -- cars, a house, cellular phones
-- which was at odds with the usual modest lifestyles of
Yogyakarta artists.

Although Yogyakarta was not a traditional art market, painting
sales in Jakarta and Bali encouraged local artists.

Despite the sweet rewards of business, there has emerged a new
crop of young artists. Turning their backs on what "sells", they
are involved in exploring caricatures, murals and drawing.

It is clear these three have no market, and could even be
termed "antimarket".

While the 1980s' generation was apolitical, works of
contemporary artists contain heavier political content. They
describe real situations in the community through a potent pop
art style. Idioms of mass culture become their mode of expression
although they dismiss the importance of materialism in their
artistic lives.

Once again, the art dialectic has surfaced in Yogyakarta. Many
would argue that it is this distinction which continues the
city's reputation as a hotbed of artistic expression.