The BAR vol.5 Exhibition "Rounds"
New works from Syagini Ratna Wulan and Duto Hardono
Syagini Ratna Wulan / "L.S." / 2010 / detail Duto Hardono / "Micro/Macro" / 2008
May 28(sat) - June 11 (sat), 2011 Sunday and Monday Closed *Admission free
hiromiyoshii roppongi 5-9-20, Roppongi Minato-ku, Tokyo TEL: 03-5772-5233
Time: 13:00 - 19:00
Organized by: Arts Initiative Tokyo[AIT]
Co-organized by: The Backers Foundation
Supported by: hiromiyoshii roppongi, YOKUMOKU
Opening Reception: May 28(sat) 18:00 - 20:00 *19:00~ performance by the artists
The Backers Foundation and Arts Initiative Tokyo are delighted to announce the 5th Backers and AIT Residence(BAR) programme exhibition, "The BAR vol. 5: Rounds" which will be held between May 28th and June 11th at hiromiyoshii roppongi. New works by two emerging Indonesian artists selected this year; Syagini Ratna Wulan(b.1979) and Duto Hardono(b.1985) will be shown. This 3 months artist in resident programme in Tokyo, is funded by the Backers foundation.
The Tohoku-Kanto Earthquake in March held back many foreign artists from visiting Japan. News around the world continue to broadcast the countless aftershocks and the ongoing nuclear power plant issue, and yet, the two began their Tokyo residency since early April. Their determination to do so under such unpredictable conditions, is undoubtedly related to their bitter experience of the Sumatra earthquake. What we can also see here is their unfathomable motivation to "create" as artists.
Syagini Ratna Wulan uses furniture and everyday utensils to create art in a variety of different media including painting and installation. In her 2010 one-person exhibition 'Love Affair pt. 1: Dining Room/ White Lies', she created a series of tables and chairs made from dripping white paints and ceramics and showed these together with a portraits of human skull. Like our bones which are normally hidden from view by our flesh, the exhibition explored the normally hidden, other sides of romantic love such as deceit and perversion. For this exhibition Ratna Wulan has made new works looking into issues of dream and reality, using old furniture, cushions and typewriters that she found during her residency in Tokyo. Her work will be shown as a series of photographs, drawings and installation. Ratna Wulan has referred to the French thinker Voltaire in explaining her works, quoting him thus: "History is nothing but a pack of tricks that we play upon the dead". By inserting the trickery of art into old, used historical objects, Ratna Wulan intends to reconfigure these things again as an artist-trickster.
Duto Hardono works mainly in sound, performance, drawing and collage. His works specifically utilize the subtle and sometimes distressing tensions which emerge from using found or readymade objects such as old cassette tapes, records, and instruments. In his work 'How To Perform John Cage's 4'33″ On A Tape Loop Delay As Demonstrated By A Band Of Cacti,' Hardono referred to the seminal sound work by John Cage '4'33″' (1952) in order to create a surreal installation comprising three cactus plants which mutely 'played' Cage's score to viewers via a home-made delay mechanical system using a pair of looping cassette tape. According to Hardono, the 'ridiculous concept' of the work is about "delaying silence." For this exhibition Hardono has used cassette tapes to transmit his recordings of the city of Tokyo randomly, also showing various collage works made up from items he picked up during the residency. Hardono will perform at the opening using a vintage synthesizer, which he recently found in Tokyo.
Ratna Wulan and Hardono have spent the past two months in Tokyo, coming across unfamiliar objects and situations, giving them new meanings and possibilities by dissolving their histories and adding new dimensions to them, going round and round. The Indonesian art scene is today a vibrant and well known one, deeply connected to the uniquely hybrid geographical, historical, religious and philosophical of the country. We can say that Ratna Wulan and Hardono are representative of a younger generation of Indonesian artists who are just as comfortable working within their local contexts as within broader global ones.
Text by : Naoko Horiuchi [AIT]
Translated by: Roger McDonald [AIT], Kaori Iwasaki [AIT]
< Artists >
・Syagini Ratnawulan (Born in Bandung, 1979, lives and works in Bandung, Indonesia)
・Duto Hardono (Born in Jakarta, 1985, lives and works in Bandung, Indonesia)
* Backers Foundation and AIT: Curator In Residence Agung Hujatnika（Curator, Selasar Sunaryo Art Space, Indonesia） will stay in Tokyo for 3 weeks from June 3rd.
Since 2007, the Backers Foundation, a private group of patrons from the business worlds, has supported eight emerging contemporary artists and four curators to visit Tokyo and stay for a 3 month residency. In 2012, a group exhibition of the 10 previous residency artists will be held. The non-profit organization AIT works with the Backers Foundation to organize and host the program.
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