Catalogue Jakarta Biennale 2017: JIWA

Opening:
Saturday, 4 November 2017
at Gudang Sarinah Ekosistem
18.30 - 22.00 WIB
Exhibition:
5 November - 10 Desember 2017
Performance Sries:
4 - 14 November 2017
Symposium:
13 - 14 November 2017
at IFI (Institut Français d’Indonésie)
Jl. M.H. Thamrin No. 20, Jakarta Pusat 10350
13.00 - 20.00 WIB
Venue:
Gudang Sarinah Ekosistem
Jl. Pancoran Timur II, No. 4 Jakarta Selatan 12780
Open daily from 11.00—19.00 WIB
Free admission
Museum Sejarah Jakarta
Jl. Taman Fatahillah, No. 1, Jakarta Barat, 11110
Open Tuesday - Sunday, 09.00—17.00 WIB
Museum Seni Rupa & Keramik
Jl. Pos Kota, No. 2, Jakarta Barat, 11110
Open Tuesday - Sunday, 09.00—17.00 WIB

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TaKING a glance through the last four editions of the Jakarta Biennale
(2009—2015), we can clearly see the salient role the event has played in
offering a myriad of themes in the reading of contemporary realities.
Over those four editions, the Jakarta Biennale brought urban issues to the
table and provided space to accommodate artistic practices offered by
artists, both in the forms of exhibitions and interventions of public spaces,
as well as site and community-based art projects. The intersections and
elements that were retained across editions were reflected in the Jakarta
Biennale 2013 with its theme of “Siasat” (strategy, scheme, maneuvering),
which was aimed at re-examining the positions and artistic practices of
society in an attempt to negotiate limitations, instabilities, issues, threats,
potentials, or opportunities available in urban spaces. Several issues came
under thorough scrutiny at the Jakarta Biennale 2015, with particular
focus being given to city and history, water and environment, and gender
and its relationship to other social dimensions that continue to structure
society. as such, the Jakarta Biennale has served as a stimulus for critical
reflection, and also celebration, of the ensuing boisterousness and noise
surrounding us.
amidthecurrentsystemthatisrifewithfanaticism,thelossofpoliticians’
sanity, intolerance, and struggle for space, it is pertinent and crucial to
rethink the forces underlying human desires, observe plural relationships,
and make use of our senses, sensibilities, and knowledge. JIWA: Jakarta
Biennale 2017 has been organized as an endeavor to perpetually enrich
and widen the artistic experiences and critical thinking skills of the general
public in approaching contemporary phenomena in a more contemplative
and sensible manner. Such is the reason behind the appointment of Melati
Suryodarmo as artistic director of the Jakarta Biennale 2017. She put
forward the concept “Jiwa” (literally ‘soul’) to discuss wide-ranging issues
and inquiries into contemporary arts and culture. Jiwa can be taken to
mean a basic human impulse, togetherness, society, nature, or anything
intangible and spiritual. armed with broad experience and sensibilities
as an artist, curator, and networker, Melati Suryodarmono is expected to
bring about a new, inspiring perspective and approach that differ from
the previous ones. after several stages of discussion, four curators were
selected to work alongside Melati Suryodarmo in planning and artistically
directing JIWA: Jakarta Biennale 2017. These curators include annissa
Foreword

JIWA: Jakarta Biennale 2017 3
Gultom, Hendro Wiyanto, Phillipe Pirotte, and Vit Havranek.
JIWA: Jakarta Biennale 2017 is taking place at Gudang Sarinah
Ekosistem, and in order to engage a broader audience, events and
exhibitions are also being held at the Museum of Fine arts and Ceramics
and the Jakarta History Museum. JIWA: Jakarta Biennale 2017 is featuring
51 artists hailing from within and outside of Indonesia. With three exhibition
venues, the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is mainly centered in two bustling areas
of Jakarta, namely Pancoran, South Jakarta, and Kota Tua, West Jakarta.
In addition to showcasing contemporary art, the artistic team of JIWA:
Jakarta Biennale 2017 has also placed particular focus on the publication
of art books, something that has been on the agenda since the Jakarta
Biennale 2013. Three books will be published in parallel with the Jakarta
Biennale 2017, namely a book of Bambang Bujono’s selected articles from
1968—2017; a book on the art accounts of Siti adiyati from 1975—1997; and
a book that contains reviews, writings, and archival materials pertaining to
Semsar Siahaan. at each and every event, the Jakarta Biennale is invariably
committed to continually providing art education to the public. One
manifestation of this commitment has been a multitude of workshops that
train the public on how to make use of post-exhibition objects. We also
invite artists to visit and teach at schools with which the Jakarta Biennale is
in collaboration. all of these activities are carried out in order to bring arts
closer to the public, especially the younger generation.
Besides the aforementioned activities, the Jakarta Biennale
Foundation will continue to strive for the development of educational and
cultural activities outside of the Jakarta Biennale itself. We are hoping to
play a significant role in the development of fine arts in the country. We put
together these activities as an attempt to widen our network and expand
our collaboration so that knowledge can be disseminated more broadly.
I would like to extend my gratitude to all of the parties involved
in making this exhibition possible, and also for the ideas, spirit, and
camaraderie that together enrich the Jakarta Biennale 2017.
Ade Darmawan
Executive Director of the Jakarta Biennale 2017

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Contents Foreword 2
CurAtoriAl introDuCtion
Whither Does Jiwa Wander? 8
Melati Suryodarmo
Reviving the Soul of Museums 14
annissa Gultom
The artist and artwork’s Jiwa 18
Hendro Wiyanto
Jiwa, anima, and Image 24
Philippe Pirotte
Sickness as a Metaphor 28
Vit Havranek

JIWA: Jakarta Biennale 2017 5
Artists
abdi Karya 36
afrizal Malna 38
alastair MacLennan 40
alexey Klyuykov, Vasil artamonov &
Dominik Forman 42
ali al-Fatlawi, Wathiq al-ameri 44
aliansyah Caniago 46
arin Rungjang 48
Chiharu Shiota 50
Choy Ka Fai 52
Dana awartani 54
Darlane Litaay 56
David Gheron Tretiakoff 58
Dineo Seshee Bopape 60
Em’kal Eyongakpa 62
Eva Kot’átková 64
Gabriela Golder 66
Garin Nugroho 68
Gede Mahendra Yasa 70
Hanafi 72
Hito Steyerl 74
Ho Rui an 76
I Made Djirna 78
Imhathai Suwatthanasilp 80
Jason Lim 82
Karrabing Film Collective 84
Keisuke Takahashi 86
Kiri Dalena 88
Luc Tuymans 90
Marintan Sirait 92
Mathieu Kleyebe abonnenc 94
Nikhil Chopra 96
Otty Widasari 98
Pawel althamer 100
Pinaree Sanpitak 102
PM Toh 104
Ratu Rizkitasari Saraswati 106
Robert Zhao Renhui 108
Shamow’el Rama Surya 110
Siti adiyati 112
Ugo Untoro 114
Willem de Rooij 116
Wukir Suryadi 118
Ximena Cuevas 120
Yola Yulfianti 122
Komunitas Bissu 124
Art Brut or Outsider art 127
Dwi Putro Mulyono (Pak Wi) 130
Ni Tanjung 132
Retrospection:
Revisiting History
Dolorosa Sinaga 135
Hendrawan Riyanto 140
I Wayan Sadra 145
Semsar Siahaan 150
Performance art & Symposium 156
acknowledgements 158
JIWa: Jakarta Biennale 2017 Team 162

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Whither Does
Jiwa Wander?
BEING both a local and international event, a biennale functions as
a general picture of the dialogue between these two spheres. This sense
of locality is one of the seminal questions for us, the art community in
Indonesia. Unending questions regarding the search for the origins of
Indonesian art have presided over and served as the basis for scrutiny of
the Jakarta Biennale 2017. Just as we can ostensibly point to an underlying
condition based on its manifestation, we can understand the driving
force of an epoch through the cultural products it creates. Does jiwa or
the driving force of an artwork still exist even though its elements have
disappeared?
The dominant paradigm through which we perceive things is a way of
thinking that sees everything according to achievements that lie directly
in front of us, from the position of where we are standing today. From
this standpoint, death is an inevitability that everyone must face. Moving
forward is always a way to seek a condition that is an improvement on what
currently exists, or to rectify past mistakes, and can only be completed
once we are not among the living anymore. By means of this criterion, we
estimate both progress and setbacks, be it thought, behavior and even
culture. One of the aims of the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is to examine this
benchmark that has dominated our thinking.
Today, art is still one of the most important aspects of life. Other than
being a cultural product, as conditioned by culture, art gives us means to
observe and extend our knowledge. First of all, this is made possible by
the personal relationship between viewers and works of art. It is almost
certain that everyone has background knowledge or past experience that
they collect throughout their lives (a tabula rasa is, therefore, impossible).
an encounter with a work of art, on a personal level, should act as a means
to extend, magnify, reinforce, or even revise our own knowledge.
Looking back into history, it eventually becomes clear that art
ought to be a part of our lives to act as an intermediary for thoughts
about humankind as beings who face all the facts of life. No matter how
many centuries are behind us and for how many more centuries human
civilization on this earth will continue, art will always find its place; whether
it is an honored or humiliated one, as the soul of objects or a vessel for
human thoughts to see into the future.
art and its creators are inevitably bound by the conditions of their
era, which is dependent on factors such as economy, politics, military, and
lately, globality. an artist, through her work, acts as a mirror reflecting her
social conditions that form the background of the art world, or even works

7
to overcome the obstacles and barriers inside the art world. Therefore, to
advance the art world, artists must work inside the art world; no creators
of art are situated or work outside the art world.
In light of this principle, the Jakarta Biennale 2017 must first be seen
as a platform facilitating various interactions of knowledge in society,
through its point of enquiry, that is, jiwa.
Jiwa, as the theme of the Jakarta Biennale 2017, appears in various
guises. Jiwa can be understood as the spirit underlying every work of art,
a platform of imagination and a creation in space and time. Jiwa as spirit
means jiwa as identity. a signifier to encapsulate and separate entities
necessary to life. Without the understanding of jiwa, we cannot understand
the diversity and background behind a number of works of art composing
the body of art. This is the meaning of “locality” as mentioned in the first
paragraph.
One of the ways to present such identity is to revisit history. History
is an expanse of various events in life in which there is power and the
forgotten. One of the aims of the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is to re-establish,
or to provide opportunities to encounter, the jiwa of Indonesian art by
attempting to venture into the lives and stories of several figures in the
history of Indonesian art. Without familiarity with the histories of art, the
search for identity, or the fulfilment of jiwa, in art cannot be accomplished.
Whereas, if the jiwa of Indonesian art cannot obtain its autonomy, then, the
domination of an esthetic regime which has been forced upon us, whether
consciously or not, can and will always loom in the dark corner waiting to
ambush.
The attempt to find the spirit or the jiwa of Indonesian art is pushed
by the passion of resistance against such esthetic domination. Moving
forward is only possible if one has a starting point. If we forever attempt
to move forward without using esthetic theories that are the fruits of our
own thinking, we will remain lost in a maze of alienation. This means that
we are more and more severed from an understanding that there are really
no cultures that are better or worse than others, there are only different
cultures; that two artworks from two artists cannot be compared in terms
of which one is better and which one is worse; that we are different and we
must feel comfortable working with this difference.
Thus, art cannot be perceived as an end to the beautiful presence
of things, however, art is jiwa that has found its deeper substance in its
relationship with life itself. This can only be possible if we understand art
as a manifestation of the living and lived jiwa. art and jiwa move together

8
as a unity infused with the breath of life. Both art and jiwa tirelessly provide
for and seek opportunities to meet humans and learn about the values of
their life. In step with the times, art flows and forms a mirror of the history
of mankind. at the same time, the totality of art depends on the love
humanity can give to it; while sustaining it, attending to it, honoring it, or
conversely—forgetting about it, debasing it and destroying it.
Withthejointeffortbytheartisticteamandtheircarefulconsiderations,
the Jakarta Biennale 2017 would like to encourage viewers to look back
and understand the thoughts and practices, in the form of an exhibition
containing archival materials and small retrospectives about several
Indonesian artists who have come before us. This small retrospective
is an effort to analyze and reveal the creative process of these artists
through their biographies and the force of their thoughts. The past forms
a valuable link in the chain of Indonesian art history. The works and the
thoughts behind these works reflect the intellectual struggle of their
epoch. Therefore, albeit to a limited extent, the Jakarta Biennale 2017 has
enquired, and finally found new aspects of our predecessors’ contribution
to the social and political domains through their works.
Like science, art maintains its endurance and sustainability in order
to continue making a contribution to humans and their lives. Hence, the
second meaning of jiwa in the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is jiwa as the necessary
condition for belief systems, which give meaning to every facet of life. In
other words, the jiwa that is present in every human being.
If we take a glance at the past, far into bygone eras, or perhaps even
human societies that existed in a primordial state, every aspect of life
was contained within a circle of life or a system of belief. Through these
belief systems jiwa is born; nothing escapes jiwa’s embrace. Neither does
creative force. When time was still so very pure, every individual had many
opportunities to think about and live out their respective systems of belief.
This is true not only in Indonesia. Movements advocating a return to our
roots, be it through archaeology or a reinterpretation of the values of
ancient belief systems, have time and again occurred throughout history.
The demise of primordial belief systems left jiwa to wither away. These
changes can be seen in every part of the world. a recent example can
be seen in the series of events that have occurred in Jakarta and other
parts of the world. as we all know, the defeat of Germany in World War II
practically erased many things connected to the traditions exploited by
the Third Reich. The same thing happened in communist Europe. Many
of the member states of the Soviet Union used images with roots in the

9
traditions of indigenous peoples. Now, those traditions are starting to be
abandoned and replaced by new images to avoid association with the
politics practiced behind the iron curtain. Unfortunately, the discourse of
the primordial is often used by the populist movements raging in every
part of the world. The debate between “indigenous” and “immigrant”
(pribumi and non-pribumi) in Indonesia is a real example of the fierce
battle between populism and democracy.
Be that as it may, talking about tradition need not be entrenched in
political jargon; the turn to tradition does not necessarily presuppose a
certain political ideology. Of course, everything must be embedded
within ideology. Ideology here is understood not only as concepts such as,
socialism, nationalism, communism, liberalism, etc. Ideology can mean a
stance or perspective, and can take any form. In the Jakarta Biennale 2017,
for instance, the underlying ideology for the concept of jiwa is a belief
system. This means a belief system exists insofar as jiwa exists. and vice
versa, jiwa can only exist as long as we have a belief system. The relation
between jiwa and a belief system is an enriching reciprocal relationship.
On the other hand, belief systems, complete with their various
paraphernalia and customs, have been frequently associated with a
repression of freedom. Considering that the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is an
art event, the freedom in question is freedom of expression or artistic
freedom. Beyond the edge lies only the uncharted territory outside the
scope of the human mind. Hence, freedom is the ability to move within
limits, be they the limits of tradition, rules, norms, culture, customs, or even
artistic convention.
Jiwa in the context of the Jakarta Biennale 2017 means an ability to see
tradition and indigenous culture with clarity. Contemporary and traditional
art are actually two sides of the same coin. One must sustain the other.
The Jakarta Biennale 2017 does not try to romanticize or glorify tradition
as represented by jiwa. Instead, by trying to re-observe and appreciate
jiwa, through a collection of certain belief systems, we can learn a precious
lesson about the importance of preserving art. In short, we attempt to see
jiwa from a realistic, not pragmatic, point of view.
The presence of jiwa embodied in various forms provides an
opportunity to reflect on the unexpected spaces penetrating the limits
of the viewers’ perspective and reasoning. The long journey one has
to undergo to trace the path of her jiwa through the works she creates,
through exploration, experimentation, and the ebb and flow of her
conscience, either direct or indirect, provides answers to the questions
that emerge from the search.

10
We can see a manifestation of that meaning through the choice of
artists participating in the Jakarta Biennale 2017. The logic behind the
selection of artists was not merely based in geography, but instead was
informed by the unifying theme of this year’s event. The selection of
participating artists is one of the ways to showcase the diversity of creative
practice. as a unifying theme collecting various forces of feeling, thought,
breath, and body, jiwa is something that we understand as one of the most
important facets of life.
Jiwa in relation to its position as the unity of desire, feeling, and the
thoughts of art-makers is presented as a commitment between private and
social spaces. The variety of perspectives about and enquiries into jiwa
was a starting point for the artists to present their work through various
methods and forms. Jiwa as a driving force in the reading of one’s cultural
biography, as a way to read human political behavior, as a platform to learn
about the influence of the esthetics of its creator, and jiwa as a spiritual
force are all a part of the exhibition, which encompasses paintings, object
installations, multimedia, video, and photography.
The relation between the first and second meaning of jiwa can be
seen as an interdependence between macro and micro universes. The
micro universe in the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is jiwa as the identity of local
art. Whereas, the macro universe is jiwa in its second meaning, that is, jiwa
as the driving force behind a universal belief system. The macro universe
consists of a set of micro universes; micro universes are composed of
various entities, one of which is the tradition of local art.
Jiwa’s interrelation with the body is a general theme to be examined,
considering both are so deeply connected to each other. The body as a
living element incorporated with the ideas and thoughts of its occupant
concerning social, political, cultural, environmental and spiritual themes is
present in a number of performance art works at the Biennale. Gestures,
texts and bodily energy in performance art prioritize actions related to
time and space. It is liminal but consists of involvements that are sometimes
abstract, poetic, but in the form of real actions and materials. Performance
art, as an esthetic strategy and a mode of practice which has become
increasingly recognized in art discourse, is an important part of the Jakarta
Biennale 2017.
additionally, journalism in the history of art in Indonesia has made
an important contribution that cannot be ignored. Journalistic writing
has made an impression and provided a reflective note on various artistic
activities. Journalism has undoubtedly provided a unique outlet for
discourse and art criticism in Indonesia and is something that needs to

11
be compiled and presented in the form of a printed book. The Jakarta
Biennale 2017 is initiating this literary tradition by publishing a collection
of essays and reportage written by artists and journalists about art and
artists.
The principal venue for the Jakarta Biennale 2017 is Gudang Sarinah
Ekosistem. However, the event itself is spread over various locations
alongside the main site. In order to reach a wider public and to facilitate
the needs of the metropolis to continually construct its physical shape and
set the speed of its mobility, the Jakarta Biennale 2017 took the strategic
measure to put numerous pieces in the Jakarta History Museum and the
Jakarta art and Ceramic Museum. The Jakarta History Museum, as a vessel
of knowledge about the city’s history with a long background dating
back to colonial times, ought to open itself to visitors through presenting
a comprehensive and critical perspective of history by displaying
contemporary artwork included in the Jakarta Biennale 2017. Meanwhile,
the Jakarta art and Ceramic Museum should be a popular destination for
members of the general public given its interest in the history of Indonesian
art and ceramics, as well as modern art. Via the Jakarta Biennale 2017
exhibition’s placement of works in Jakarta’s museum spaces, one of the
functions of the museum as a public place is augmented by the intersection
with recent artistic discourse.
It is never too late to try something new, and there should be nothing
that dampens the fiery passion to continue to enrich and share the various
discourses of life through art’s jiwa.
Jakarta, October 28, 2017
Melati suryodarmo
artistic Director of the Jakarta Biennale 2017
Melati Suryodarmo was born in
1969 in Solo, Indonesia. She studied
art and finished her postgraduate
program in 2003, majoring in Concept
of Space and Performance art at the
Hochschule fuer Bildende Kuenste
Braunschweig, Germany. Suryodarmo
has presenting her performances in
various international festivals and art
exhibitions around the world, such
as The Life of Egon Schiele in Van
Gogh Museum amsterdam (2005);
Videobrasil, Sao Paolo (2005); 52nd
Venice Biennale Dance Festival (2007);
KIaSMa, Helsinki (2007); Manifesta7;
Bolzano (2008), In Transit festival,
HKW, Berlin (2009), Luminato Festival
of the arts, Toronto, (2012), asia Pacific
Triennale, Qagoma Brisbane (2015),
Guangzhou Triennale, Guangdong,
China (2015); Singapore Biennale,
Singapore, (2016), Sunshower—
Contemporary art in Southeast asia—
National art Centre Tokyo (2017),
etc. Since 2007 she facilitated PaLa
(Performance art Laboratory Project)
and “undisclosed territory”, an annual
performance art event. In 2012, she
founded Studio Plesungan in Solo, an
alternative space for performance art
laboratory.

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WE OFTEN emphasize keywords such as “identity”, “origin”, and
“reminder of history” when talking about museums in Indonesia, removed
from any discussion on abstract concepts and the will of the nation’s
psyche. Don’t believe it? Take a look at museums with the word “national”
in their name, which have borne witness to the difficulty in presenting
Indonesia’s sense of nationalism. Subject to obstacles in their development,
Indonesian museums are not yet able to discuss the abstract matters that
set the foundation of the items in their collection. Protecting our intangible
cultural heritage is a task that remains in the early stages, since we are
still largely occupied with protecting our tangible heritage culture. Most
of the museums in Indonesia present artifacts left behind by the departed,
without properly dissecting the underlying traces of humanity, outside of
the cultural systems that serve as the basis for academic analysis.
Museums in Indonesia have yet to begin an in-depth exploration of
what is actually represented by the expressions of aesthetics-forming life
tools that humans have created, used, and left behind. This is probably
why most of our museums were founded and established with political
undertones and with the aim to create the image of a nation’s identity, a
nation that was repeatedly colonized, be it by its own people or people
from other nations. Perhaps this is also why our museums have yet to lure
repeat visitors, people who use them as a source of inspiration, instead of
mere backgrounds for selfies.
In the context of Indonesia, the understanding of a “museum” or
“gallery” is strangely boxed into works from various civilizations in its
definition. as an institution, a “museum” is more associated with the
aspects of history, archeology, and anthropology, while a “gallery” has
more to do with “pure” fine arts or other types of modern art. This is a
vastly different condition compared to the United States or Europe, where
artworks representing a wide range of civilizations are displayed without
regard to the time period or posing a burden to the collections of ancient
artifacts with the task of establishing a nation’s identity. This issue stems
from Indonesia’s colonial history, which employed the works of researchers
in the fields of natural and cultural sciences to explore and establish the
nature of potencies and threats possessed by a colonized region in order
to measure to what extent exploitation can continue. Results from these
explorations are what we see in the country’s oldest museums, such as
Museum Nasional Indonesia (the National Museum of Indonesia). In the
beginning, the museum also displayed collections of paintings and fine
arts from the East Indies period, in addition to humanities books. However,
reviving the soul
of Museums

15
based on a later policy, these collections were eventually spread out
and used as initial collections for Galeri Nasional (the National Gallery)
and Perpustakaan Nasional (the National Library). Only one museum
was established from the get-go with the aim of establishing a fine arts
collection, which is Balai Seni Rupa Jakarta (the Jakarta Fine arts Hall), now
known as Museum Seni Rupa dan Keramik (the Fine arts and Ceramics
Museum) in the Kota Tua (Old Town) area. The museum initially began with
a modern-day fine arts collection compiled by Mitra Budaya Foundation.
Up to now, the “divorce” between modern and ancient Indonesian
fine arts—with the latter having existed since the end of the prehistoric age
until the East Indies period—is still ongoing what with the lack of dialogue
between these two classifications. Conventional museums typically display
exhibitions on modern or contemporary arts, but in a separate room and
with little to no interaction with their permanent collections. This might
be one of the aspects that currently hinder dialogues with Indonesia’s
historical roots, whether in the context of geographical ties or the national
concept spearheaded by our founding fathers.
Museums, alongside maps and censuses, are the factors that form a
nation’s image—as Ben anderson puts it. That is also the raison d’etre of
museums in the Old Town area. In the 1970s, Jakarta governor ali Sadikin
began the conservation process in the area. It began by determining
the area’s legal status as a preserved cultural heritage area by reusing a
number of old buildings surrounding the Fatahillah square as museums,
among which were Museum Seni Rupa dan Keramik and Museum Sejarah
Jakarta (the Jakarta History Museum), two additional venues for the 2017
Jakarta Biennale.
Unlike Museum Seni Rupa dan Keramik, which began as a fine arts
hall accommodating and displaying a selection of fine arts collections,
Museum Sejarah Jakarta carries the more complex task of displaying the
city’s history. Located in the former Batavia City Hall (Stadhuis) building,
the museum was previously used for the administrative functions of
military institutions and West Java’s civil administrations in the early days
of Indonesia’s independence. The building was established in 1707 by the
colonial government to replace the old Stadhuis (also in the same location),
turned into the biggest monument and symbol of the colonial era in Java.
The Old Town area itself is a remnant from the Batavia period, the center
of the VOC’s headquarters in Southeast asia since 1619, which was then
operated by the East Indies colonial administration upon the company’s
bankruptcy in 1799. Its functions carried on until the Japanese occupation
began in 1942.

16
The Stadhuis building was known for hundreds of years as the
“Talking Building”, since its rooms were constantly used for a wide range
of administrative, business, and legal activities. Power and exploration
was the “soul” of Stadhuis at that time; the central “soul” of a colonial
government that suppressed, blackmailed, divided, discriminated, and
dictated how the islands across the archipelago could be used as machines
to maximize profits. Hundreds of years of brutal rape and war were carried
out based on mandates made in the building. ailed souls, be they white
or brown, marked their triumph via the suffering of other brown-skinned
people: people who were less fortunate, who were not born from noble
bloodlines, and who worshipped nature—many of whom did not even know
soft cotton and were oftentimes used as commodities. Therefore, when
the post-independence cultural policy wished to transform the building
into a public museum, restoration was called for to renew its “soul”.
alongside his team, ali Sadikin assigned artists Harijadi Sumadidjaja
and S. Sudjojono to come up with two special artworks, which would
become an inseparable part of the building’s physical construction. It was
an advanced vision for its time and realized cooperation between artists to
depict history with a visual approach and a larger picture, in order to renew
the building’s “soul”.
The two artists were chosen to carry out a visual history study so they
would be able to depict the situation of a given era with the strongest
resemblance. S Sudjojono, a modern fine arts artist/painter whose heyday
began during the Sukarno era, painted the Batavia invasion by the Mataram
troops in 1628 and 1629. It was deliberate that the canvas size matched the
size of the wall in the southern part of the building, specifically the Sultan
agung room. For this painting, he went on a sketch study to the Netherlands
as well as the Surakarta Sultanate. Harijadi Sumadidjaja, the only artist sent
by President Sukarno to Mexico to study mural-making, painted Batavia
during 1820-1950 in three wall murals at Museum Sejarah Jakarta. These
murals could not be finished since the groundwater permeating the walls
caused the watercolor to fade. The museum briefly implemented a policy
to limit public access to these two artworks, amid concerns regarding
space limits and conservation. This took place before the Sultan agung vs
VOC-themed painting was subject to conservation maintenance and a new
museum flow in 2017, which placed the Harijadi murals at the entry point.
Eventually, the vision that was conceived in the 1970s, to give a “soul” to
the former Stadhuis building and color the museum with the traces of its
past, was realized.

17
as of today, there are no other conventional museums in Indonesia
that aim to bridge the past and the present via art. This is what the 2017
Jakarta Biennale aims to change. Differing from existing practices, the
2017 Jakarta Biennale has the initiative to bring contemporary fine arts
into museums. “Jiwa” or “Soul”, as the theme of this year’s Jakarta Biennale,
is a great momentum, with the event being held around the same time
of revitalizations done by museums organized by the Jakarta regional
government, started with both mentioned museums.
Museum Sejarah Jakarta is ready to present its new museum flow in
October 2017, at the same time ready to host the works of selected artists
participating in the 2017 Jakarta Biennale. Some are placed in a separate
room from the museum’s main display areas, while others are inserted into
these areas, reorganizing the arrangement of current displays. all artworks
have been chosen to incite dialogue among visitors and encourage them
not to take what’s presented in the museum at face value. This inisitatif is
hoped to be the trigger to develop that possess a soul and a dynamic life
that provoke questions, discussions and discourses, and become spaces
where old ideas are tested, while welcoming new perspectives.
Annissa Gultom
Curator of the Jakarta Biennale 2017
annissa Gultom has been working
for and with museums since 2002
when she was a bachelor student in the
archaeology Department, Universitas
Indonesia. She began her involvement
as a volunteer of public program guide
in the Jakarta History Museum, which
was then followed up by curatorial works
for temporary exhibitions in 2006 for the
same museum and Museum Nasional.
after she completed her master in
Museum Communication program of
Museum Studies Department, at the
University of the arts, Philadelphia,
Pa, USa, she continued further her
works in museum design and research.
Today her experiences in museum and
exhibits are mostly in the subject of
archaeology, anthropology, cultural
heritage, modern history and relevant
ethnographic living culture. Other than
curating exhibits, as a museologist
she has also been involved in different
facets of museum projects, such as
database development, education
program design, public communication
strategy, storage system development
and audience research. In 2013-2016
she was the director for Museum Kain in
Bali, and currently acts as curator for the
Jakarta History Museum and Museum
Bank Indonesia until December 2017.

18
the Artist and
Artwork’s Jiwa
“When did the light come on?”
“About ten minutes ago.”
Ten minutes ago. A good name for a theme or a painting title, I think. Then what
would the visual look like? Wait. First, the light goes out, and then it comes on
again 10
minutes later. That means there’s been ten minutes between the light going out
and it being turned back on. If the blackout is multiplied by the light-on and then
divided by ten,
what is the average speed…?
December. 04.
(Ugo Untoro, Cerita Pendek Sekali, 2017, p. 62).
THE PLaTFORM and agenda of the Jakarta Biennale 2017 are united
by a very complicated theme: jiwa, which has been interpreted through a
handful of definitions that emphasize both the broadness and specificity
of the term.
Jiwa refers to immaterial things: ideas, thoughts, concepts, language,
the mind, spirituality, intuition, feeling, social relations, relations with
nature, the process of dematerialization, the ephemeral nature of time and
space, and so on. Jiwa is also projected onto every physical being whose
presence we can feel: my body, our world or my world, the people around
us, our physical environment, antique objects, as well as the physical reality
of contemporary art that contains a certain spirit or identity. Through
jiwa we can feel more deeply the presence of the aforementioned things
and perceive their defining features. The transcendental aspect of jiwa,
as mentioned above, cannot be entirely severed from the physical world,
which provides the basis for its existence. Jiwa requires both means and a
medium to realize its transcendental aspect. The duality of jiwa and non-
jiwa is usually elucidated in two distinct statements. Firstly, the seeds of
transcendence cannot be treated like specks of dust in a laboratory; and
secondly, jiwa—because of its requirement of a body—cannot be present to
mourn its own death.
The extensive definition of jiwa eludes our grasp. In a tangential
discussion with fellow curators of the Jakarta Biennale 2017, we tried
to delineate such an extensive definition. For example, by tracing the
meaning of jiwa in its social and cultural contexts across Eastern and
Western frames of reference. What is the meaning of a “national spirit”

19
(jiwa bangsa), the “spirit of the people” (jiwa masyarakat), the “spirit of
socialism” (jiwa sosialisme), or the “spirit of capitalism” (jiwa kapitalisme)?
Does jiwa in those phrases have the same meaning as what can be found
in sentences in which we are talking about the body-soul-spirit triad? The
spirit of the restless poet who wants to live “a thousand years more,” or
“once with meaning and then die,”1
of course is incommensurable with the
poetical spirit in collective traditions, such as pantun.2
Trying to reach a unifying meaning of jiwa, which encompasses various
things and states of affairs, brought us to something univocal. We are using
the word jiwa in this identical and unifying meaning. Univocally, the word
jiwa, in the context of a popular musical group, for example, means the
same thing as the word jiwa in the sentence “let the spirit rise, let the body
rise” in Indonesia Raya, the national anthem. This univocal identity gives
jiwa a unifying yet indistinct meaning.
On the contrary, the distinctive meaning of jiwa brings us to an
equivocal meaning. Every usage of the word takes us to a completely
different meaning. Each of these meanings refers to a specific entity. The
word jiwa, for example, in Gogol’s Jiwa-jiwa Mati (Dead Souls) has a totally
different meaning from jiwa in a bissu ritualistic performance from South
Sulawesi. Due to the equivocal nature of language, the meaning of a word
cannot be readily substituted with another word even though they sound
the same. For example, the word “curse” (kutuk in Indonesian can mean
chick), which Sudjojono used to refer to the young Persagi (Indonesia
Organization of Drawing Masters, 1937-1942) artists full of hope for the
future, would have had a different meaning to the word “cursed are those
involved in making forgeries of Sudjojono’s paintings.”
The language that relates breadth, singularity, ambiguity and
distinction is the language of analogy. Through analogy, the word jiwa
in the prayer phrase “jiwa-jiwa di api neraka” (souls burning in the fire of
hell) can have a more or less identical, and at the same time different,
meaning to “jiwa” in “Rumah Sakit Jiwa Grogol” (Grogol Mental Hospital)
or “contemporary artists suffering from bipolar disorder, a type of mental
illness.”3
In analogical language, the emphasis on sameness and difference
can have the same probability. Sameness does not render both words
identical, but the elements of difference do not reveal separate, distinct
entities. Sameness and difference do not dismiss the fact that there exists
a difference in kind and degree in reality, for example, between physical
and non-physical reality, corporeal and transcendental reality, between
the human and non-human, etc.
1. Two lines from the poetry
of Chairil anwar, one of
the most important poets
in Indonesian literary
history.
2. a form of traditional
Indonesian poetry.
although originally an
oral tradition, today it has
found its way into written
form. It usually consists of
four lines with an a-b-a-b
rhyme scheme.
3. In Indonesian, the word
jiwa can mean mental as in
mental illness.

20
What is the meaning of Jiwa as the theme of the Jakarta Biennale
2017?
In Indonesia, surely no artist expounds the meaning of jiwa with
more clarity than Sudjojono (1913-1986). His most famous statement
was “art is jiwa manifest.” But, what did Sudjojono really mean? Under
the shadow of Sudjojono’s words uttered almost a century ago, I asked
Melati Suryodarmo—artistic director of the Jakarta Biennale 2017—about
the exposition of jiwa in this event. The intentionally thought-provoking
question I asked was, “So, what is your opinion of Sudjojono’s famous
statement about how the work of an artist is jiwa manifest?”
Sudjonono’s concept of jiwa manifest does not have a critical area,
answered Suryodarmo. It seems that way, I answered in a perplexed
state. Since then, I’ve started to ponder the meaning of “critical area” in
Suryodarmo’s reply. Where do I begin? Does it originate in the artist or
their artwork? What is a “critical area” really? Must it be used to discuss the
artists or their works in the Biennale? How would we go about this?
Our conception of art and artwork cannot in reality begin with one or
the other. I am reminded of the notion about the relation of a certain art
practice and theological thinking. For example, the discourse of formalist
art in Western art. Formalism was challenged by the notion of “anti-art.” If
the proponents of formalism saw their art as “art,” they were seen as being
closer to the “history of art.” If “anti-art” (another term for “conceptual art,”
especially in the West) is an effort to escape from the tradition of “art”, its
proponents were said to have celebrated the triumph of “the history of art
theory” over “art history.” Through “anti-art” tendencies, art theory seemed
to evolve in a place too far removed from the history of art (practice), to
some extent even ignoring it. There has been a state of over-discourse
in the practice of art. art ends and is replaced by theory. art becomes a
branch of philosophy.
Yet, what we call “anti-art” is not really outside or traitorous to the art
world. Doesn’t “anti-art” quietly claim to be “art”? “anti-art” has also invited
criticism because it identifies “doing art” with art practice and “practicing
art” by doing nothing.
The basis of theology, according to the writings of Thomas McEvilley,
is the dispute between reason and faith in the long tradition of Christianity.
“art theory history” can be seen as rooted in reason, while “art history
(practice)” can be traced to what is called the practice of “faith.”
If art tradition rejected “anti-art” reasoning, then what really happened
is that theological discourse moved to a narrower plane, namely art.

21
This dispute is a contest between the domain of reason and faith-based
experience. Excessive puritanism that insists on the supremacy of jiwa or
spirit obtains its articulation in art formalism. “Language” is considered
predominant compared to the physical material championed by “anti-
art” artists, who extolled the artistic values of urinals, rubbish or merely
playing chess. The former being considered more rooted in jiwa and more
“faithful” than the latter.
It appears that analogical language can help us find the critical
area inside the contemporary art dispute described above. This means
using anti-art as an analogy to art while not completely dismissing the
“anti,” or using “art” as a liberal way to point out the provocation of “anti-
art.”Explorations of the relationship between art practice and jiwa can
be found, of course, in the sphere of classical philosophy. For example,
a tradition known as mimesis, or the practice of artistic imitation, is
considered to be far removed from the notion of the ideal. The tradition of
mimesis dates back to Platonic ideas of the form. Nevertheless, stopping
at this tradition means that an artist’s jiwa will never be found, anytime
or anywhere. The tradition of mimesis would later gain further traction
through the assumption that the product of imitation is a representational
entity, a more or less independent product. This product of mimesis creates
a certain form, unity, and design. The aim of these forms, in the words
of a theater student with a penchant for quoting aristotle, is to describe
the nature of humanity, an expressive action because of the presence of
jiwa (psukhē). artistic practice slips from the grip of the soulless tradition
of mimesis to become a substantial spiritualistic practice. Regrettably,
in Indonesia’s formal art education tradition, art practice almost always
claims to be the most “faithful” and the “purest” compared to other
artistic disciplines, including theater. and we all know the result of these
unconscious “cleansing” processes.
Hence, if we look back to Sudjojono’s claims about “jiwa manifest”
quoted above, we can see that he was closer to the aristotelian thinking
of theater students with their concepts of “catharsis” or “psukhē” than art
students with their über-ideal Platonic dreams. Thus, should we look for a
critical area of discourse in the expression “art as jiwa manifest” or should
we unquestionably accept the phrase?
Readers of Sudjojono treat the word jiwa as something self-evident,
something with a definite identity, or sometimes even as something with
just one meaning. Sudjojono’s description of jiwa (which is manifest) is of
course related to artwork. His view about this concept is like a description

22
of an inverted mirror. artwork has a certain relation with reality through the
artist’s jiwa. Of course, Sudjojono never clearly defined what he meant by
the word “jiwa.” However, through the explanation below, we can surmise
his interpretation of the word. Jiwa exists in the artist’s body. In this respect,
surely the meaning of “in the artist’s body” is not as simple as pointing out
a certain locus.
The relation between the artist’s jiwa and the artwork’s jiwa can be
illustrated as an inverted mirror: reality > eyes > jiwa >< jiwa > artist’s
hands > artwork. Reality only gives birth to an artwork through the artist’s
jiwa. However, the artist’s jiwa is still a mystery according to Sudjojono,
because it possesses many “chambers.” These chambers process or filter
the artist’s perceived or experienced reality in order to form it into a
certain language, that is, art. We don’t know which “chamber” manages
this perceived reality, or what is hidden when the artist’s jiwa is cultivating
its ideas. Does the “jiwa manifest” in Sudjojono’s ideas dismiss or quietly
include the intangible?
Even though he believed in the artist’s jiwa, throughout his life
Sudjojono never created abstract paintings. In fact, his view of abstract
painting was very distinctive. In his view, abstractness is connected to
a reality higher than physical or material reality. If material or physical
objects can be a measure of the welfare of a person or a society, then it
is impossible, for example, for an impoverished society or artist to create
abstract objects. That is a rough outline of Sudjojono’s social platform of
the jiwa of artists and their work. We can re-familiarize ourselves with his
social platform through his seemingly individual ideas. as a consequence,
should we open and find jiwa’s critical area in the ideas of a great artist? Or
should we swiftly preempt such a possibility?

23
Hendro Wiyanto Budiman
studied art at the Indonesian Institute
of art (Yogyakarta) and philosophy at
the Driyarkara School of Philosophy
(Jakarta). He has been a curator for some
exhibitions in Indonesia and writing
about artists and groups of artist, such
as alit Sembodo, Dolorosa Sinaga, FX
Harsono, the New art Movement, Heri
Dono, Jogja agropop, Gede Mahendra
Yasa, Melati Suryodarmo, Ugo Untoro,
S. Teddy D. Hendro Wiyanto Budiman
now resides and works in Jakarta.
“Jiwa” in the Jakarta Biennale—as a common meta-discourse in an
event such as this—should mean an effort to find such a critical area in
conversations about contemporary art.
Jakarta, October 27, 2017
Hendro Wiyanto

24
JIWA, a concept defying English translation, is cherished in collective
consciousness throughout the Indonesian archipelago. It encompasses the
whole spectrum of relations one could characterize as “animistic”, tapping
into a very old tradition of spirituality. In all its shades of meaning, jiwa
can be understood as the energy that forges relations between things. It
is considered a driving principle that inhabits and animates individuals,
societies, non-humans, and nature. It represents “life”, but also enthusiasm,
spirit, inner self, thought, feeling, mentality, essence, and implication, and
as such the concept of jiwa goes beyond the traditional understanding of
the idea of the “soul”. In terms of Indonesian embodied culture, jiwa is to
be understood as feeling and consciousness, as something that moves
all living things in good ways, or bad. But jiwa is also—and this is what is
most relevant for the exhibition project—a medium of perception, situated
between the most bodily or physical layers of the human psyche and the
most abstract ones, closely connected to the ability to express, to interpret,
and the capacity for deep feeling and intuition.1
an ancient Greek concept analogous to jiwa can be found in nous (Latin:
anima), which stood for soul or psyche (‘psychē’, or ‘psychein’ meaning ‘to
breathe’ in Greek). Nous embodied the mental abilities of a living being:
reason, character, feeling, consciousness, memory, perception, thinking,
and so on. The important difference between nous and jiwa is that nous
or anima is attributed to living beings in a strict hierarchical order. The
hierarchy follows a progression from less to more consciousness. Human
beings are situated at the end of the chain, and benefit from more potential
of nous, enabling them to perceive and formulate concepts. Though
primarily thought of as a means to forge relations, attachments, attractions,
and inclinations that together weave a world, jiwa can also be considered
as an attribute to human beings, just like nous or anima.2
Just as jiwa channels perception, in Greek philosophy nous is an
“absorber of images.”3
In aristotle’s famous text De Anima, the soul actually
thinks, and it does not think without images:
“To the thinking soul images serve as if they were contents of perception (and
when it asserts or denies them to be good or bad, it avoids or pursues them).
That is why the soul never thinks without an image. The process is like that in
which the air modifies the pupil in this or that way and the pupil transmits the
modification to some third thing (and similarly in hearing), while the ultimate
point of arrival is one, a single mean, with different manners of being.”4
This complex paragraph suggests that the soul comprises an ordering
principle of perception and a moral one. The moral faculty needs the image
Jiwa, Anima,
and image
1. Marc Benamou, Rasa.
Affect and Intuition
in Javanese Musical
Aesthetics (Oxford:
Oxford University Press,
2000), 45.
2. In its most extreme
interpretation, the
jiwa of human beings
is thought to be
concentrated between
the head and the hair,
and in the past some
groups sought to
promote their own jiwa
at the expense of an
adversary.
3. Bruno Snell, The
Discovery of the Mind:
The Greek Origins of
European Thought
(Oxford: Blackwell, 1953)
p. 198.
4. aristoteles, De Anima,
3rd Book, 7th Paragraph,
413a, 16-17.

25
(the soul never thinks without an image), which it judges at the same time.
That for aristotle the image goes far beyond a mere ocular perception, it can
be derived from the fact that he introduces the faculty of hearing as part of the
image-making process. But the most important fragment of this quotation
is in the last line: “…the ultimate point of arrival is one, a single mean, with
different manners of being.” This seems to be an attempt at defining the
image as a combination of perception and imagination, bound together in
an ambiguous relationship. Here, the moral faculty enters into the equation:
disagreement about images is a primal characteristic of aristotle’s “thinking
soul”. and so, one can suppose, the moral discernment of images guides us
ethically in the world. There are images that appear to the “thinking soul”—
so they exist—but are avoided, while other images are actively pursued. an
interesting parallel to the concept of jiwa, which can be both benign and
malevolent, is that for the ancient Greeks the power of images was evident,
even in its negative guise. This is demonstrated in Greek mythology, most
notably by the stories of Narcissus, Orpheus, and Medusa.
aristotle’s “thinking soul” assumes the pure “eye of the mind” (some sort
of imagination) and the impure but immediately experienced sight of the
actualeyesasconstituentsforconceptualization.LaterWesternphilosophers
such as Voltaire also believed nothing could be conceived without an
image,5
and Immanuel Kant, in his Reflexionen zur Anthropologie, seems
convinced that all conception needs imagination. If one wished to study and
understand the human mind in the 19th
century, one would need methodical
access to mental images that would exceed speculative intuition and the
introspection of rationalism, and reach beyond empirical Sensualism.6
But a
fear of the power of such images symptomatically appears in the 19th
century
Western thought, which presupposes a strongly entrenched disquiet for the
mythic, the mystic, and the animistic; the strongest opponents of modern
rationality.7
Swaying back and forth between a fascination for the image and
a basic iconoclastic desire, Western thinkers in the 19th
century turned away
from the ambiguous situation in which image and reality merge, in which
the borders between the iconic and the real dissolve. Living with mental
images was thought to be subjected to a fatalistic influence that distorts the
image of reality, encouraging the “unreal”, the illusion, the hallucination, or
the dream.
Subsequently, the progressive development of analytical philosophy
at the beginning of the 20th
century allowed for a further denigration of
vision, because thinking had now been understood as a verbal, discursive
undertaking. Nous, anima, the thinking soul, thinking in images, or vision
5. “Rien ne vient dans
l’entendement
sans une image”,
Voltaire, Imagination,
in: “Encyclopédie
méthodique: Grammaire
et littérature”, Volume II
(1784), 295.
6. “Sensualism” is an
empirical philosophical
doctrine, according to
which sensations and
perception are the basic
and most important form
of true cognition, which
may oppose abstract
ideas.
7. Like it is the case in E.
T. a. Hoffmann’s Der
Sandmann, Oscar Wilde’s
Picture of Dorian Gray,
Edgar allan Poe’s Oval
Portrait, or Nathaniel
Hawthorne’s The Scarlett
Letter.

26
itself—long considered the noblest of the senses—came under increasing
critical scrutiny by a wide range of thinkers who questioned their dominance
in Western culture. These critics of anima challenged its allegedly superior
capacity to provide access to the world.8
But even if so-called “pre-modern”
forms of magic, myth, cult, religion, and ritual may have officially dissolved
in our modern societies, the energies contained in these spiritual structures
now float as specters through all systems and levels of modern society to
rewrite themselves (uninvitedly) into its structures.9
The iconoclastic impulse of discursive thinking hides a fascination for
the image. Images are magic, according to Czech-born philosopher Vilém
Flusser,10
because they substitute experiences for facts and translate them
into imaginable scenes. Because of their inner contradictions and their
inherent dialectics, images are vulnerable to both religious expulsion
and deconstruction by rational, discursive thinking. as Flusser states,
history is characterized by the conflict between discourse and image,
revealing a dichotomy between historical consciousness and magic. He
claims that texts do not represent the world; they represent images. To
decipher texts thus means to discover the images they represent. The aim
of the written word is to explain and interpret images and to retrieve the
meaning of notions, terms, or concepts in order to understand visions. The
image might be elucidated by text, but the text depends on visuals to be
imagined. Likewise, rational thinking analyzes magic in order to eliminate
it, but magic slips back into conceptual thought to invest it with substance
or significance.
8. See: Martin Jay,
Downcast Eyes. The
Denigration of Vision
in Twentieth-Century
French Thought
(Berkeley and Los
angeles, California: The
University of California
Press, 1993).
9. No theory of modernity
seems falser as the
one that identifies
modernizing with a
growth of rationalism.
See: Bruno Latour,
Nous n’avons jamais
été modernes: essai
d’anthropologie
symmétrique (Paris: La
Découverte, 1991).
10.See the chapter “Das
Bild” in Vilém Flusser,
Für eine Philosophie der
Fotografie (Göttingen:
European Photography,
1983).

27
It is probably exactly because images have such magical meaning that
artworks are made. and it is for the same reason art is destroyed. Time
and again artworks evoke images that are able to create an ambiguous,
uncontrollable situation for those—authority or subjects alike—who wish to
rationally understand the world, and read sense into our surroundings.
Philippe Pirotte
Philippe Pirotte is an art historian,
critic and curator for various
international exhibitions. He had his
education as an art historian at the
University of Ghent. In 1999, he co-
founded objectif_exhibitions art center
in antwerpen. In 2004 he became a
senior advisor at the Rijksakademie
for Visual arts in amsterdam. Next, he
became the director of Kunsthalle Bern
in Switzerland (2005-2010) and adjunct
senior curator at the UC Berkeley art
Museum and Pacific Film archive (in
2012). Currently he is the director of
Städelschule in Frankfurt am Main,
Germany, while also an advisor of
program director for Sifang art Museum
in Nanjing, China.

28
This text addresses a number of works at the Jakarta Biennale 2017,
but it also follows its own theme, and as a result shouldn’t be read as
representing the exhibition as a whole. It focuses on the issue of sickness,
its medical conception, and also how sickness is perceived by a patient,
which are topics all loosely linked to the theme of “Jiwa”. Sickness is not a
popular topic in the theory of contemporary art or within its institutional
context. Materials connected with degradation—impotence, inadequacy,
disability, laziness, failure—among which we could also classify sickness,
provoke antipathy, which resembles fear of contamination. Sickness is an
indication (index) of death, just as smoke sends us a signal that something
is burning nearby.
The theme of social sickness, which we could refer to as a pandemic,
became fully apparent to us in 2007. Jacques Rancière, in his analysis of
the financial crisis, recalls the originally medical derivation of this term. In
the Hippocratic tradition of ancient Greece, crisis was a decisive moment
in the course of an illness and its treatment: when the doctor, after having
used up all available means to save the patient, ceased his efforts and
left the battle with sickness to the patient (and to nature), with the result
that the patient would in the final phase either take on and conquer the
sickness, or succumb to it. However, as Rancière states, in its current usage,
the word “crisis” means the opposite. The financial crisis in 2007 did not
bring about any culmination or resolution, but rather established itself as
a pathological and chronic state that was transmitted from the economic
sphere to society, and was transformed into a social sickness.
“and naturally a sick society calls precisely upon that person whom the old
crisis displaced, namely the doctor... and demands the attentive and constant
care of a good doctor of society. The only problem is that the only doctors
available are the originators of this crisis, who manage the production of
wealth, and it is they who in the name of this production destroy the obstacles
to its development.”1
Jacob Woods, the main character in Liquidity Inc. (2014),2
is a financial
analyst (though not a doctor, but a Clinical Laboratory analyst) at Lehman
Brothers who loses his job during the financial crisis in 2007. Successfully
liberated from an environment in which he was under constant supervision,
he retrains as a practitioner of Mixed Martial arts, a recently established
discipline enabling the use of all the previous rules of contact fighting.
This fluid, professional transition into a world of semi-naked bodies in
shorts with a guard over their genitals, who instinctively throw themselves
sickness as a
Metaphor
1. “La pensée du
present“, Lecture
at Institut Français,
athens, January, 30,
2014, https://vimeo.
com/85497014.
2. author: Hito Steyerl.

29
upon a mattress fenced in by elastic ropes to take part in an “anything
goes” contest, will come as a surprise to nobody. Both environments are
governed by similar rules. However, the “Inc.” has a second meaning. In
addition to the legal status of a corporation, “incorporated” also means
‘integrated in one body’, ‘embodied’.
Western or classical allopathic medicine approaches the body as
a complex (biological) machine. Nevertheless, from the perspective of
the subject, the body may be perceived as a machine only so long as it
functions. as long as it is healthy and works, it may be “forgotten and/or
surpassed in carrying out my projects in the world”.3
If the body falls ill, the
subject rejects the medical metaphor of the body as machine as foreign,
nonetheless it is precisely at this moment that it comes into contact with
medicine. Sickness is felt by the ill person not only as localized pain, a
partial non-functioning of one part of the whole, but as something that
encroaches upon the subject’s sense of being-in-the world. Our hero
Woods is a special case. He embodies illness as an increase in muscle
tissue. He suffers from an alienation, typical of the sick, between the
Self and the body, which is realized as a reduction of the lived body to a
perverse, narcissistic identification of the self with bodily intentionality and
body image.
Etiology of disease states that the lack or excessive proliferation
of certain organisms or inorganic substances in the body is a cause of
sickness, and nature or medicine heals us by re-establishing the disturbed
balance. The high priest Bissu of the Bugis tribe, whose cultural legacy can
be seen in the performance by the Bissu Community,4
states: “If one of the
five genders were to be separated, the world would become unbalanced.”
The Bugis, an ethnic group inhabiting the south of the island of Sulawesi,
distinguish between five gender identities, which are differentiated by the
following names: makkunrai (feminine woman), oroané (masculine man),
calai (masculine female), calabai (feminine male), and bissu (transgender
shaman). In the mosaic of images of gender identities composed of partial
aspects, the lack or excessive proliferation of a masculine female (calai), for
example, would threaten not only those who identify themselves as such,
but all the other subjects sharing a common aspect of identity, and as the
high priest states, would create an imbalance of the whole.
The main theme of the film Secteur IX B (2015)5
is colonial practices of
the collection and import of natural and cultural artefacts to the metropolis.
This fictional story draws upon elements from the actual mission Dakar-
Djibouti (1931-1933), which is known to us thanks to the books of the
3. J.P. Sartre, Being and
Nothingness (1943), cit.
from S. Kay Toombs,
“Illness and the Paradigm
of Lived Body“, Theoritical
Medicine 9, no. 2 (1988).
4. author: Bissu Community.
5. author: Mathieu Kleyebe
abonnenc.

30
French writer Michel Leiris. But illness and madness (as well as hygienic
and medical doctrines) are inherent to colonialism, as has been often
demonstrated since Frantz Fanon. It is not only the fact that the film’s main
hero, anthropologist Betty, falls ill—evidently as a consequence of contact
with material contaminated by colonial practices. Medicine in the colonies
was an important instrument of colonial administration:
“Initially, assuring the health of European soldiers, traders and settlers
in hostile climates was the priority, and strategies of avoidance and
separation the preferred methods. In time, the focus shifted to the health
of indigenous populations, primarily as a means of ensuring the availability
of a pool of productive labour. In either case, ‘public health’ served the
interests of colonial powers, with improvements in local health (excepting
male members of the labor force) a negligible and secondary side-effect.”6
Western colonial medicine doesn’t proceed as a healing force, but
separates those who need it, neglecting to heal them, and within hygienic
doctrine creates ill out of healthy populations. This could be why these
“strategies of avoidance and separation” in very contemporary works with
a colonial and neo-colonial theme—Secteur IX B, WUTHARR, Saltwater
Dreams (2016), Ones Who Are Being Controlled (2016)7
—seek paths beyond
the framework of western post-colonial theory and its academic episteme.
“Each of the pills she swallows is like a condensed medicine box. These
drugs profoundly modify her perception of reality. She writes that it is
when subjectivity reaches its climax, that one reaches objectivity.”8
altered
states of consciousness as a way to reach the ancestors, hallucinations
about equality with nature, talking in one’s sleep, and burning of colonial
images are methods through which equality in thought is to be attained.
The work Ones Who Looked at the Presence (2017)9
directly rejects the
notion that a contemporary artist from a former colony could speak about
issues of colonization from the position of a hereditary victim. It is a cultural
trope that is already processed in the ex-colonial collective consciousness,
and serves as vaccination for neo-colonial politics. The author resolved
the dilemma of stolen images (of people´s faces looking into the colonial
cameras) through a radical cleansing, disinfecting it by setting it on fire.
The chain of events in the videos When the Dogs Talked (2014),
WUTHARR, Saltwater Dreams (2016)10
is immediately reminiscent of
The Idiot (1868),11
transposed into a current neo-colonial framework.
The historical and class context is entirely different—“Tribulations of
legislation, indigenous policy, and policing in the Northern Territories” are
a chessboard delineated by the biased politics of controlling indigenous
6. Nicholas B. King,
“Security, Disease,
Commerce: Ideologies
of Postcolonial Global
Health”, Social Studies of
Science, 32/5 (October–
December 2002)
763–789.
7. author: Em’kal
Eyongakpa, Karrabing
Film Collective
8. Mathieu Kleyebe
abonnenc, Secteur IX
B, 2015.
9. author: Otty Widasari
10.author: Karrabing Film
Collective.
11.author: Fyodor
Dostoyevksy.

31
populations. But even despite this, even in the conduct of the Karrabing
Collective, as in that of the Prince Myshkin, the intersubjective urge decides.
The search for a family member, which is intended to stave off moving out
of home, is disturbed by a meeting with relatives in distress, a walk through
the landscape is controlled by an encounter with ancestors whose will may
alter the direction of the journey. The heroes must act and alter the path
of their movement within reality according to the acuteness of the urge.
“To be acutely conscious is a disease, a real, honest-to-goodness disease,”
says a Dostoevsky´s character in another book.
Psychoanalysis is not interested in the functioning of memory as such,
but rather its lapses and other errors, because it is precisely these that
indicate to the analyst the encroachment of the patient’s unconscious into
the chains in which events are stored or imprinted upon memory. at this
moment, it is necessary to separate individual and collective memory. arin
Runjang, in the recently completed work 246247596248914102516... And
then there were none (2017) recapitulates the traumatic experiences of his
childhood. His father, who was employed as a sailor in the merchant navy,
was brutally beaten by neo-Nazis in Hamburg, and later died at home as a
result of his injuries. The individual narrative is interwoven with memories
of the artist’s grandfather, who was on the wrong side during the anti-
monarchist uprising of 1932, and with the recollections of the last official
visitor to adolf Hitler in his underground bunker in Berlin. The function of
forgetting, according to psychoanalysis, is to suppress traumatic events
from the past, or replace them with false memories. Recollection and its
public repetition thus have the function not only of a “subjective” historical
testimony, a subjective historicization of the event of a racist attack, but is a
defense against the working of the author’s unconscious, which endeavors
to suppress or alter recollections. If the subject does not defend himself
and allow himself to forget, he will lose the ability to constitute his own
future. “It is not a question of reality,” states Lacan concerning the aim
of the psychoanalytical process, “but of truth, because the effect of full
speech (i.e. psychoanalysis) is to reorder past contingencies by conferring
on them the sense of necessities to come, such as they are constituted by
the little freedom through which the subject makes them present.”
as we know, fever is not a sickness, but a successful defense of the
body against infection. Requiem for M (2010)12
, Fiksi (2016)13
, and In the
Memory of the Birds (2010)14
represent a defense of the collective body,
and collective memory against its falsification or amnesia. In the first phase,
collective memory is formed by means of communication as information
12. author: Kiri Dalena
13. author: Otty Widasari
14. author: Gabriela Golder

32
about events. If information is under the control of the organs of state, and if
these organs are direct actors as they were in the case of the Maguindanao
Massacre in 2009, treated by Requiem for M (2010), this distorted version
of events lays the foundation for a false collective narrative. “Images” of
national history always reflect the position of power and class identity of
those who ordered them; they act in the interest of their preservation and
continuity (Monumen National, 1969-1976). Reminiscence is the only cure
for collective amnesia (the dictatorship of argentinian military junta 1976-
1983 treated by In the Memory of the Birds, 2010), to salvage events that
the strict censorship of the military regime has erased from reality.
The immune-system response of the curatorial team of the Biennale
against the amnesia of the history of art of the Indonesian neo-modern
period is a display of two authors with different artistic practices and
destinies in life—Siti adiyati and Semsar Siahaan. adiati was a member of the
group Gerakan Seni Rupa Baru (GSRB—New art Movement), which in two
declaratory exhibitions transformed the conditions of esthetic discourse
through a radical inclination toward the international movements of neo-
dada, pop-art, and object art with a strong relevance to vernacular social-
political issues. Unlike the male protagonists of the group (Jim Supangkat,
FX Harsono, Dede Eri Supria, Nyoman Nuarta, etc.), adiyati, due to social
norms and circumstances, remained outside of the spotlight of attention
focused on the group. Her paintings, both from that period and later,
drawing upon post-surrealism and also avant-garde painting (Picasso),
have remained in the shadows to this day.

33
Vit Havránek is a Prague-based curator
and art organizer. Since 2002 he has
been the director of a contemporary
art initiative, tranzit.cz (www.tranzit.
org). tranzit.cz is a production platform,
exhibition hall (tranzitdisplay), discourse
platform (lecture series, talks, thematic
conferences) and publishing house.
Since 2007, tranzitdisplay has been a
host to solo exhibitions of Eric Beltrán,
Eija Lisa ahtilla, Ján Mančuška, Sung
Hwan Kim, apichatpong Weerasethakul,
Babi Badalov, Luis Camnitzer, Haroun
Farocki, Carla Filipe, Ruti Sela, Loulou
Chérinet, Július Koller, Emily Roysdon,
Chto delat?, Raqs Media Collective,
Trinh T. Minh-Ha, etc. Vit Havránek,
together with Zbynek Baladran (display),
has been co-directing the hall since
2007-2015. Havránek is also a curator
for many exhibitions in many places
(Manifesta 8, Muzeum Sztuki Lodz, City
Gallery Prague, New Museum Hub, VOX
Montréal, etc).
The destiny of the work of Semsar Siahaan (1952-2005) was determined
by his artistic activism in the time of the New Order. During his studies at
the Bandung Institute of Technology, he set fire to a statue of his teacher,
for which he was expelled from the school. He was a radical activist, and
his sketches and monumental paintings since the 1980s contain an original
synthesis of a post-modern approach to painting and social themes,
criticizing the abuse of political and economic power.
Vit Havranek

34
Abdi Karya (Indonesia)
Afrizal Malna (Indonesia)
Alastair MacLennan (United Kingdom)
Alexey Klyuykov, Vasil Artamonov & Dominik Forman (Czech Republic)
Ali Al-Fatlawi, Wathiq Al-Ameri (Switzerland)
Aliansyah Caniago (Indonesia)
Arin Rungjang (Thailand)
Chiharu Shiota (Japan)
Choy Ka Fai (Singapore)
Dana Awartani (Saudi Arabia)
Darlane Litaay (Indonesia)
David Gheron Tretiakoff (France)
Dineo Seshee Bopape (South Africa)
Dolorosa Sinaga (Indonesia)
Dwi Putro Mulyono (Pak Wi) (Indonesia)
Em’kal Eyongakpa (Cameroon)
Eva Kot’átková (Czech Republic)
Gabriela Golder (Argentina)
Garin Nugroho (Indonesia)
Gede Mahendra Yasa (Indonesia)
Hanafi (Indonesia)
Hendrawan Riyanto (Indonesia)
Hito Steyerl (Germany)
Ho Rui An (Singapore)
I Made Djirna (Indonesia)
I Wayan Sadra (Indonesia)

35
Imhathai Suwatthanasilp (Thailand)
Jason Lim (Singapore)
Karrabing Film Collective (Australia)
Keisuke Takahashi (Japan)
Kiri Dalena (Philippines)
Komunitas Bissu (Indonesia)
Luc Tuymans (Belgium)
Marintan Sirait (Indonesia)
Mathieu Kleyebe Abonnenc (France)
Ni Tanjung (Indonesia)
Nikhil Chopra (India)
Otty Widasari (Indonesia)
Pawel Althamer (Poland)
Pinaree Sanpitak (Thailand)
PM Toh (Indonesia)
Ratu Rizkitasari Saraswati (Indonesia)
Robert Zhao Renhui (Singapore)
Semsar Siahaan (Indonesia)
Shamow’el Rama Surya (Indonesia)
Siti Adiyati (Indonesia)
Ugo Untoro (Indonesia)
Willem de Rooij (The Netherlands)
Wukir Suryadi (Indonesia)
Ximena Cuevas (Mexico)
Yola Yulfianti (Indonesia)

36
Abdi Karya
Bugis traditional culture is a source of inspiration for Abdi Karya in creating his
works. In playwriting, theater and his performance art, Abdi Karya always seeks to
elucidate meaning from philosophical ideas found in customs, old stories, and Bugis
mythology. One of his main sources of inspiration is the Bugis masterpiece I La
Galigo, a story about the creation of the universe, which is still shared by farming
families.
For Abdi, the human body can be likened to a Buginese home, which consists
of three sections: the upper world, represented by the head (mind); the lower
world, personified by the body (fertility); and the middle world as the place of the
soul (spirit). Awareness of these three things leads to spatial perception, that is,
the interior space (woman, tenderness, femininity) and the exterior space (man,
strength, masculinity). Home, as a stationary physical space, is a cosmos for the mind
and body. Home is a birthplace and at the same time, a place to return to.
In Memakai.Dipakai, created in 2016, Abdi Karya utilizes the sarong as a symbol
of a kind of “second skin” in Buginese society The sarong is a signifier of space,
time, and the state of affairs; for the Bugis people, from their birth to their death,
the sarong is almost always present. In daily traditional life, the sarong holds various
functions, from a piece of clothing, a food wrapper, to a climbing tool. The sarong as
a second skin is a place for the body to grow across time. The mind and will (desire)
make humans oblivious to time. The body becomes a place of struggle between the
spirit, intellect, and reality.
Memakai.Dipakai is Abdi Karya’s effort to share his observation that modern
society looks at tradition as something to be proud of but not preserved. For him,
tradition holds depth and he uses it as a way to read the present and to understand
his roots; how he connects with the world outside his field of work.
Since 2004, his works set off from I La Galigo in an attempt to reintroduce the
manuscript as a theatrical work. Since 2007, he has worked with American theater
and visual artist Robert Wilson. From 2011-2017, Abdi served as the development
and cooperation manager at Rumata’ ArtSpace Makassar. He initiated Performance
Lab, a workshop, training, presentation, discussion, and performance program in
Makassar and formed a multinational theater collective, 5ToMidnight International.
As an actor, director and stage worker since his college years at the Makassar
State University, Abdi Karya has built working networks with artists from various
disciplines, both in Indonesia and abroad. Currently he is in the middle of preparation
for a multidisciplinary platform of residency in several art spaces in Makassar. [MS]
Abdi Karya was born in Sengkang, Indonesia,
in 1982. After graduating from Makassar
State University, he continued his education
at Muhammadiyah University of Makassar.
Since 2000, he has been active in theater
and performing art as actor, director, stage
manager, stage designer, dancer, and crew
member. Since 2013 he has been developing
his performance art practice.

37
Memakai.Dipakai | 2016
Performance art | Textile, sarong | 5 days, 4 hours per day
Photo: Panji Purnama Putra

38
Afrizal Malna
Afrizal Malna was born in Jakarta in 1957. He
writes poems, short stories, novels, literary
criticisms, plays and scenarios, while also
editing books and producing art video. He
has received some awards, such as from the
Jakarta Arts Council (1984), Tempo magazine
and Kusala Sastra Khatulistiwa (2013).
Afrizal Malna is a poet and writer who works with various media including text,
hypertext, sound, video, and installations. He has studied philosophy, participated
in poetry festivals, and was featured on Poetry International Web. Teman-Temanku
dari Atap Bahasa, published in 2008, was chosen as the best literary work of 2009
by the Indonesian magazine Tempo. Since 2016, he has also been a member of the
Theater Committee of the Jakarta Arts Council.
Since the 1980s Afrizal has continued to address in his works the subjective,
poetic language that is closely intertwined with Indonesian urban cultures. An
interest in enumerations (“Warisan Kita”, 1989), lists, and summaries (Jembatan
Rempah-Rempah) gives his creations a certain affinity with the work of Georges
Perec and the methods of Oulipo (Ouvroir de littérature potentielle). A conceptual
approach is also a mainstay of his video poems, which combine sound poetry
with video-animations. In his video work, Malna privileges the phonetic aspect of
speech—repetitions, musical declamations, and rhythm—over the semantic quality of
language. The visual aspect of his video works makes use of footage from his direct
environment (including images of himself), found images of nature, and moving
abstract patterns juxtaposed against each other (5 Gempa Orang), post-produced
in a way than evokes the parallelity between poetical and visual methods. Esai
Tentang Alfabet is a recording of a visual poem derived from the alphabet written by
the author on a whiteboard. The poem merges into a drawing of a poetico-linguistic
diagram. This conceptual logic is enhanced in Esai Tentang Puisi, a visual essay about
the relation of words (signifier) and objects (signified). Starting by placing a pen on
the board, Malna writes the word PEN next to the object and further continues while
creating a tautological poem of objects and their language signs. These works best
show his affiliation with conceptual art and visual poetry that situate the principle of
language signification as the origin of knowledge and inter-human communication.
Malna´s installation Alarm (2017), conceived specifically for the Jakarta Biennale
2017, questions the relationship between words and their semantic references.
Using the techniques of hypogram, association, and antonym, Malna is attempting
to seek a series of words that may “ring” with jiwa. What if our jiwa could ring like an
“alarm” sounding a “warning”? What would happen if in Indonesia’s main dictionary,
Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, the definition of “alarm” as a “warning” was replaced
by “jiwa”? Using the logic of the Indonesian language, Malna deconstructs the
prevailing affinity of meanings to play with his own invented language. [VH]

39
A>L>A>R>M | 2017
Installation | A box, crackers, debris, video | 400 x 400 x 240 cm
Above: spatial installation; photo: Farid Burhanudin
Below left: still photo from video, courtesy of the artist
Below right: crackers (inside the box); photo: Farid Burhanudin

40
Alastair MacLennan
Born in 1943, Alastair MacLennan grew up
in Blairatholl, Stanley, Kinross, Perth, and
Dundee, in Scotland, before living in Chicago
and Charleston, USA, then moving to Nova
Scotia and Vancouver, Canada. Since 1975
he’s been based in Belfast, Northern Ireland,
traveling and working internationally.
Under the piercing glare of sun and soaked by heavy rain, Alastair MacLennan
sat for six hours, unmoving. As if in meditation, his performance in 2008, for
undisclosed territory #2 at Padepokan Lemah Putih, Solo, involved him sitting
“motionless” inside a heap of dirty, reeking domestic trash covering almost every
part of his body, except his head. During the performance, it was as though his body
dissolved into the structure of time-eternal and time-invented, between space-
objective and space-invented. There, the body holds no authority of verbal meaning
with respect to subject-object relations. The interconnections that emerged during
the performance, were unity of mind and body, energy over time/space and
poetics, which he presented in a tone of tranquil melancholy. This “condition” was
a presentation of his reflection on human puncturing (and “punctuating”) of various
difficult conflicts in humanity. For MacLennan, art is he intersection between hope
and the will to overcome external and internal conflicts in spirituality, religion,
politics, self, culture, and diverse permutations of “difference” in societies; ecology
being not merely relations between humans and the natural environment, but
between mind/body and soul.
MacLennan’s output is not limited to performance art. He creates installations
which engage aesthetic subtleties, while simultaneously embracing contradictions
of “unrest”, as exemplified in Body of (D)earth, at the Venice Biennale (1997), where,
on thin strips of paper, he presented printed out names of victims killed in the Irish
Troubles, from 1969 to 1997 while a death-like, institutional, “organic” stench of
increasing entropy, heightened a deepening, sombre mood.
At the Jakarta Biennale 2017, MacLennan is presenting Ash She He, a
performance work of short duration, investigating empathy beyond conflicts of
identity. MacLennan invites the public to enter an awareness which addresses the
transformation of suffering. The primary materials he has chosen, such as ash, water,
rocks, branches, paper, glasses, buckets, etc., are treated not only symbolically, or
as elements to add a “poetic” note, but signal his inclusion of a public’s everyday
actuality. For MacLennan, Ash She He shows a transitioning from “stasis”, to an
“opening up” of time/space concerns and values.
MacLennan’s devotion to performance art is also shared with communities and
groups. Besides co-founding Belfast’s Art and Research Exchange, he is one of the
co-founders of Bbeyond, a performance art organization in Belfast and a member
of Black Market International, an international performance art entity. In addition,
he is a Professor Emeritus from Ulster University, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, an
Honorary Member of Dartington College of Arts, Devon, England and an Honorary
Associate of the National Review of Live Art, Glasgow, Scotland. [MS]

41
As She He | 2017
Performance art | 30 - 40’
Photo: Adi Priyatna

42
Alexey Klyuykov
Vasil Artamonov
Dominik Forman
Alexey Klyuykov & Vasil Artamonov were born
in 1983 and 1980, respectively. They are an
artist duo who have been collaborating since
2005. Although originally from Russia, they
have been living in the Czech Republic since
they were young children, and graduated
from the Academy of Arts, Architecture
and Design in Prague. Currently they also
collaborate with Dominik Forman.
Vasil Artamonov and Alexey Klyuykov are an artist duo of Russian origin who
started to collaborate during their studies at the Academy of Arts, Architecture and
Design, in Prague in 2005. In the beginning, their works were mostly conceptual art
(Monument to the Third International, 2005) and performances (How We Helped,
2006). In The Course of Autumn (2010), the duo created a monumental installation
of archaic machines from wooden materials found in the Poldi Kladno factory in
the Czech Republic. The factory is known as a prominent case of unsuccessful
privatization, which led to the closure of one of the biggest industrial sites in the
country. The installation Wisdom (2007) was a display of silhouettes of beards of
famous historical personalities (Karl Marx, Mikhail Bakhunin, Piet Mondrian, Slavoj
Žižek) cut from wood.
Since approximately 2007 Artamonov and Klyuykov have turned their focus to
painting and in particular its history, from the perspective of historical materialism
as an archive of unfulfilled utopias of the future. In Photographs of Freight Truck
(2007), they painted copies and variations of Kazimir Malevič’s composition on
train buffers. The “tiger’s leap”—according to Walter Benjamin—that interrupts the
continuity of the history of painting starts for the duo with Russian constructivism
and cubism. In the series of paintings Fire in the Library, Demonstration and Globe
(2007), conceived in a “cubistic style”, their concern was not to demonstrate the
application of analytic cubism on real objects, but the performative use of painterly
language in a collective process that commented on the absence of any imagination
of better futures. The paintings combine barely abstract, indented cubical still-
lifes on a white background with short or longer textual slogans painted in a non-
typographic, free-hand fashion.
Artamonov and Klyuykov’s series of paintings exhibited at the Jakarta Biennale
2017 are related to their more recent research, carried out in collaboration with artist
Dominik Forman. In the Manifesto of Radical Realism (2016) that they co-authored,
they argue for collective authorship and art that is directed toward the antagonisms of
post-capitalist society. Their interest led them deeper into the archaeology of futures
and history of the early Russian avant-garde (the group Jack of Diamonds, 1910-
1917). More recently, the subjects of their paintings vary from still-lifes of working-
class paraphernalia or documents relating to the theories of historical materialism to
the portraits of historical personalities (Rosa Luxemburg, Pablo Picasso) or relate to
the motifs in paintings of various progressive realists. [VH]

43
Material Basis of Spiritual Life | 2012
Oil on canvas | 62x52 cm
Courtesy of the artist
Still Life with a Basket and Bricks | 2011
Oil on canvas | 45x105 cm
Courtesy of the artist

44
Ali Al-Fatlawi,
Wathiq Al-Ameri
Ali Al-Fatlawi and Wathiq Al-Ameri were
born in Baghdad in 1972. Since 1997 they
have been living and working in Zurich,
Switzerland. This duo have participated in
many art events, among others The Open
International Performance Festival (China,
2009) and the Venice Biennale (Italy, 2012).
The performances of Wathiq Al-Ameri and Ali Al-Fatlawi reflect and challenge
the West’s attitudes to Iraq and Iraqi culture—the fears and expectations and the
dread arising from civil casualties, border-crossings, and the psychological pressure
expressed in physical gestures. The mortal as part of everyday life, dealing with
acts of war and the role of memory, and lives lost in war are also important subjects
expressed in their performances. Al-Fatlawi and Al-Ameri won the Performance Art
Award Switzerland in 2011, which was followed more recently with the prestigious
Swiss Art Award 2012. This duo are based in Switzerland and collaborate as part of
the studio Urnamo founded in 2002. They have known each other since childhood
and studied together at the Baghdad Arts Academy in Iraq and F+F Schule für
Kunst und Design.
One of the subjects that appears regularly in Al-Fatlawi’s and Al-Ameri’s
various performances is the importance of memory. They believe that memories
are stored in the body and that their elements can be retrieved from the past to
be accommodated in the present. As such, frictions between an official version of
an event, its mediatic version, and reality lived by humans is a matter of concern
of their performances. In White Haunting Black, performed at the Art Festival of
Spitsbergen (2015), two figures wore contrasting costumes of Black and White. Even
though they carried out actions in the same space, they were occupied by different,
parallel activities—Black working manually, White walking and playing golf—and
their paths never crossed. Watching one of the duo’s typical performances—the
viewer doesn’t need any kind of comment or direct explanation; literally everyone
takes part in the alienating matrix of labor and divisions of power.
In order to speak without words and express narration by action, they use a
wide range of objects. They also often use symbols of war and peace—military
helmets, red roses, plastic soldiers that may be burned during performances,
refugee life jackets, and various cultural symbols, such as Iraqi carpet that marks
their origins. Their performances take place in theaters as well as in public places or
landscapes, such as the prehistoric landscape covered with snow at the Art Festival
of Spitsbergen, giving them a monumental stage.
At the Jakarta Biennale 2017 the artist duo are presenting a work titled Vanishing
Borders or Let’s Talk About the Situation in Iraq, (2014), which is an existential
cogitation about the borders of life and death, and the instinct of destruction that
annihilates the unique universe that each human contains. [VH]

45
Vanishing borders, or let’s talk about the situation in Iraq | 2014
Performance art, video | 3 days, 6 hours per day
Photo: Zainul Arifin & Panji Purnama Putra

46
Aliansyah Caniago
Public space is not something new for Aliansyah Caniago’s art practice. Despite
his background in two-dimensional art as part of a major in painting at the Bandung
Institute of Technology (ITB) (2006-2011), he has always been interested in the form
of public-related art practice. Since 2012 he has explored performance art in public
spaces based on the necessity to dissolve himself into the public’s daily problems
and his wish to work with a larger community.
His focuses are identity, memory, social circles, tradition, and modernity. He uses
landscape and social space interchangeably. According to Aliansyah, landscape
cannot be understood as a panorama or static vista. Landscape art experts can
show that landscape (landschaft, landscipe) is formed by two things, that is, land and
skabe, schaffen or ship (partnership). There is a human element and space formation
in every landscape because of human presence and interaction.
At the Jakarta Biennale 2017, Aliansyah observes the fast-changing drama in the
residential community of Kampung Akuarium in Penjaringan, Sunda Kelapa, North
Jakarta. Kampung Akuarium is an area on the outskirts of Jakarta that has grown out
of proportion in regard to its residents, floods, and fires.
The social landscape which Aliansyah has observed since 2016 is a consequence
of policing and residential relocation by the Greater Jakarta administration. A
number of residents who have moved to a new area have always tried to return to
their previous home despite it having been levelled to the ground. As if one within a
reciprocal relation with their old “landscape,” many residents of Kampung Akuarium
have built new homes from the debris.
By identifying himself symbolically with the debris of social life, Aliansyah tries to
bring his sensibility closer to the real traces of struggle of the kampong’s people. He
has dubbed his practice con(tra)ceptual art. Inspired by the term conceptual art, for
Aliansyah, his performance practice is against overly conceptual art.
He has splits his performance between two separate places. In the first place,
he grinds up the remnants of debris in Kampung Akuarium as a sign of the artist’s
presence. The debris is then crushed to fill a punching bag, which is taken to his
performance space at the Jakarta Biennale. This is his second performance space.
The sandbag serves as a means for the public to be physically involved as well as a
symbolic presence of the violence and wrath of the social landscape.
As a former amateur boxer in Bandung, Aliansyah is trained to use the body’s
physical movements and potential to face an opponent. The body’s ability to take a
punch becomes a symbolic narrative to evoke our memory of social spaces imbued
with indiscernible struggle. The same can be said of the presence of debris; invisible
traces of invisibility inside the cover of the punching bag. [HW]
Aliansyah Caniago was born in Tangerang in
1987. Together with some friends he founded
Ruang Gerilya, a collective art space. He
has received several awards, including the
Top Honor Indonesian Art Award (2015) and
Bandung Contemporary Art Award (2015).

47
Sunda Kelapa: Selamat Datang Jakarta | 2017
Installation, performance art, HD-video, punching bag | 8 hours per day
Above: performance art documentation., photo: Panji Purnama Putra
Below: still photos from video, courtesy by the artist

48
Arin Rungjang
Arin Rungjang’s first encounter with “Bengawan Solo” was when he saw In the
Mood for Love (2000) directed by Wong Kar Wai. The song, which in that movie was
sung by Shanghai’s Rebecca Pan, was written in 1940 by the 23-year-old Gesang
Martohartono. In 2000, Arin Rungjang was 26 years old, tortured by a sensual feeling
he had harbored for one of his classmates—despite his adoration for his then lover
—ever since he was a little boy. He identifies “Bengawan Solo” with that romance
and melancholia, but in a rather bitter way. It was so powerful, it destroyed both his
body and soul.
Arin Rungjang then traced the genesis of “Bengawan Solo”and found that
the song was about a river called Bengawan that passes through the city of Solo.
Composed in a keroncong style, a genre influenced by Portuguese culture from the
15th
century, the song depicts the beauty of Bengawan Solo. From that moment, the
meaning of “Bengawan Solo” for him started to change.
Subsequently, he found the story of Anneke Grönloh, a singer with Tondano
and Dutch blood whose childhood was spent in a Japanese concentration camp in
the Dutch East Indies. Anneke then moved to the Netherlands and in 1967 referred
to her childhood memories by releasing a rendition of “Bengawan Solo”. In her
childhood, “Bengawan Solo” was a very popular song among Japanese soldiers.
Anneke’s story reminds Arin Rungjang of Koo Bun Koo Gum, a popular love story in
Thailand involving a Thai girl and a Japanese soldier. This story is representative of a
style of Thai love stories that end without clear resolution. It is only implied that Koo
Bun Koo Gum ends with the soldier lying on the girl’s lap with his life fading after an
American bomb attack during the Second World War.
During the purge of communists and people of Chinese-descent in Indonesia
from 1965 to 1966, Bengawan Solo was a place where many dead bodies were
thrown. Those bodies were taken by trucks and thrown into the river. Several months
back, Arin Rungjang visited the river and the true story of the massacre decimated
his romantic desire.
Arin Rungjang’s works are inspired by situations from everyday life and history.
He uses various media, especially video and installation, which refer to specific sites
to dive into history and the everyday life of its subjects. Through the mesh of time
and space, his work takes us into different layers of meaning.
In the seven-channel video work Bengawan Solo, Arin Rungjang invites Rachel
Saraswati to sing “Bengawan Solo” with her keroncong group. The display of the
individual singer and musicians on every screen is synchronized with texts recounting
his personal experience. Arin Rungjang implies that the meaning of things that we
find can change drastically following the tides and turns of our lives and the stories
revealed in unexpected situations. [MS]
Arin Rungjang was born in Bangkok, Thailand,
in 1974. He has presented his works at, among
other places, the Venice Biennale (Italy, 2013)
and in Faraway So Close! by Arin Rungjang
(2013) in Den Haag, the Netherlands.

49
Bengawan Solo | 2017
7-channel HD video installation, audio
Still photo from video, courtesy of the artist

Catalogue Jakarta Biennale 2017: JIWA

Catalogue Jakarta Biennale 2017: JIWA

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