By Lynn Lee
Indonesia Correspondent
lynnlee1@sph.com.sg

 

Art aficionados have plenty of choice when it comes to poring over paintings and sculptures in Indonesia’s capital.

Besides a handful of museums – like the National Gallery which houses changing fine art exhibitions – there are also numerous galleries in the south of the city.

A year ago, nine galleries got together to launch the Jakarta Art District in the basement of the popular Grand Indonesia mall, showcasing an array of avant-garde and contemporary fine art.

Last week, one of Jakarta’s newest art spaces – a marketing gallery belonging to property developers Ciputra - unveiled the city’s latest annual art event: the Jakarta Contemporary.

Under a balmy evening sky, a host of artists, critics, socialites and Mr Ciputra himself – known as one of Jakarta’s foremost architects and ethnic Chinese businessmen – toured the inaugural exhibition titled 1,001 Doors: Reinventing Tradition.

INTERPRETATIONS

The organisers had gotten 101 artists from across Indonesia to offer their interpretations of the theme.

Upon viewing the final works, the curators chose to organise the exhibition around eight sub-themes, such as "Door to Traditional Space" where the works dealt with traditional Indonesian heritage and "Virtual Doors", where artists chose to use their imagination and present metaphorical doors.

I returned to the exhibition on a breezy Sunday afternoon to take a closer look at the exhibits and was struck by how nostalgia ruled for many artists.

Bandung-born batik designer Tri Asayani chose to draw on memories of her late father, a batik-maker who used to produce traditional pieces for Japanese clients.

She printed layers of organdy cloth with batik, putting an image of her father on it, and hung the cloth within a wooden cabinet frame, with its doors open.

Further down, Jakarta-based artist Iswanto Hartono chose to simply use a weathered wooden door, complete with pencil markings.

Around half of the artists chose to showcase a door itself in its different wooden and metal forms, embellished with unique touches and a sense of humour.

Bali-based Pintor Sirait had a stainless-steel airplane exit door titled "Get Me Out of Here". The curators also included street artists Respecta Street Art Gallery, whose work can be found on the walls of underpasses in Jakarta.

Their extensive wall mural was wild and colourful, featuring a giant mouse and a woman perched on a toilet seat with the words "And if the door to your heart is locked, I will enter through the window" - in Bahasa Indonesia - above her head.

Indonesia’s renowned clothmaker and designer Josephine Komara, better known as Obin, presented a portal - an entry point for traditional and modern culture to mingle.

She draped multitudes of handcrafted fabric in various prints and colours around a circular metal frame with a hole in the middle  "like a donut", she quipped privately.

Visitors, including many youngsters and a number of tourists, were suitably impressed by the array of talent on display. What added to their enjoyment - and mine - was the venue.

The gallery is set back from a busy main road lined with dirty shophouses and clogged with cars and motorcycles. Yet barely 20 metres away from the madness is a glass-house structure with high ceilings and plenty of natural light.

That Sunday, as leafy shrubs and trees bowed and swayed, and prosperous and golden koi fish flipped and darted through a body of water snaking around the building, it hardly felt like downtown Jakarta.

lynnlee@sph.com.sg