Sesudah banjir itu: No. 32

Griya Seni Hj. Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso, Hyphen—, Tom Nicholson with Ary “Jimged” Sendy, Aufa Ariaputra, Nasikin

When the flood is over: No. 32
2023

Installation comprising 23 dolls (cast resin figurines) on a table; two HD videos in colour; a second set of dolls for diorama no. 32 along with their moulds, stored at Griya Seni Hj. Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso

Credit:
[Speakers] Anusapati, Ari Sutondo, JJ Rizal, Mon Mudjiman
[Sculptors] Telo Studio dan Ady Try Laksono, Andrea Gani Hidayat, Ari Sutondo, Baramasta Iid Ulfitra, Dirga Yudhistira Indrajaya, Hudalil Musttaqim, Mon Mudjiman, Qomari Hidayatulloh
[Crew] Bagyo, Liemena Sapriya Putra (Teken), Muhamad Berri Mondigir, Sarah Aulia Rudiana, Sarino, Supriyanto (Ncang), Titis Sekar

Commissioned by Museum MACAN through the support of the Australian Government through Creative
Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body.

Hyphen— acknowledges funding support from Foundation for Arts Initiatives (FfAI).

ABOUT THE WORK

When the flood is over begins with a question of conservation: how to conserve the extraordinary, vast cycle of dioramas at Museum Sejarah Nasional, located in the underground of Monumen Nasional. These dioramas were made under the supervision of Indonesia’s eminent sculptor Edhi Sunarso (1932-2016) during the 1960s and 1970s and narrate the coming into being of the Indonesian people, Sunarso’s diorama-making involved huge teams of young sculptors and prominent painters following elaborate textual guidance generated by a collective of historians. Pak Edhi himself had stated to President Sukarno that the materials he used to make the dioramas would only last for two decades.

In 2007, an attempt to revisit and revise the dioramas and their conservation was initiated by a collective of historians but nothing proceeded. Recently, an open call was made for architects to propose ‘an update’ of the Museum Sejarah Nasional, including a renewal of the dioramas. Anticipating a careless—or, even worse, ahistorical—move in the name of rejuvenation, When the flood is over is an independent attempt to conserve these dioramas made in the turmoil of a huge political shift in the mid 1960s. Initiated and worked on by a group of civilians working in solidarity, When the flood is over is also the realisation that it will be a long-term—if not never-ending—DIY process of copying the diorama figures by hand, one diorama at a time, to slowly generate sets of the dioramas to be stored in the Griya Seni Hj. Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso, in Yogyakarta.

The first iteration of this project takes as its subject Diorama No. 32, which presents the reading of the Proclamation of Independence on August 17, 1945. The 23 dolls (cast resin figurines) from this remarkable diorama are copied collectively through an open call, which gathered six young sculptors along with two invited sculptors Ari Sutondo and Mon Mudjiman, who as young men worked in the diorama team under Pak Edhi. A number of historians, artists, and researchers were invited to speak during the process of copying these figures. Completed at the Griya Seni Hj. Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso, with the sculptor Nasikin as the studio chief, these processes are the basis of a video work that follows every stage of the process. The installation at Museum MACAN presents the 23 painted figures of the Proclamation diorama. A second set, housed in their moulds, left unpainted, are held in perpetuity at Griya Seni Hj. Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso, in waiting for the moment they need to arrayed in the place of the original figures at Museum Sejarah Nasional.

When the flood is over is a meditation on histories. It is also a meditation on pedagogy – learning history, learning to make and re-make, learning to think across generations and archaeologies of time. When the flood is over dwells on words: on proclamations, writing, speaking, re-telling, and on the processes of making they precipitate. It follows the complex ways that these processes of making are also entanglements of imagining and re-imagining, within and beyond art.

BIOGRAPHIES

Griya Seni Hj. Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso (est. 2015) houses hundreds of artworks as well as thousands of photographs and documents belonging to the sculptor Edhi Sunarso (1932-2016) and painter Kustiyah (1935-2012). Indonesians recognise Edhi Sunarso as a maker of the national image. Edhi Sunarso and his fellow artists built three enormous monuments in the first decade of the country’s independence under the direct order of President Sukarno. Kustiyah, meanwhile, was a painter, printmaker, clothing designer, flower arranger and organiser. Apart from actively exhibiting her works, Kustiyah also played a role in various community and artist organisations. The studios and groups to which both of them belong include Pelukis Rakyat, Keluarga Arca, and the Yogyakarta Artists’ Wives Association (IKAISYO).

Both were educated at the Indonesia Academy of Fine Arts (now Indonesia Institute of the Arts) in Yogyakarta. They exhibited together at the Senisono Art Gallery, Yogyakarta, in 1969, about a decade and a half after they were married. Sculptor Edhi Sunarso dedicated the building behind the house he lived in until the end of his life to the painter Kustiyah who had passed away before him. Today, Griya Seni Hj Kustiyah Edhi Sunarso is jointly managed by their children and grandchildren. It can be visited by prior arrangement.

Hyphen— was co-initiated in 2011 by Ratna Mufida, Pitra Hutomo, and Grace Samboh as a sustainable conversational space regarding aesthetic practices. Not long after, that space expanded through engagement in various artistic activities, including exhibition-making, various forms of publishing, archiving, research, open-ended conversations, karaoke, barbecue nights, feasts, etcetera. Hyphen— aims to put forward curiosity and people’s common wellbeing as the estuary of artistic practices. They were joined by Akmalia Rizqita “Chita” and Rachel K. Surijata (in 2020); as well as Ruhaeni Intan and Andri Setiawan (in 2023).

They currently play with explorations on the practices of Indonesia New Art Movement (1975-1989), Kustiyah (1935-2012), and Danarto (1940-2018); exhibition histories surrounding Kesenian Indonesia (Indonesian Art, 1955), BINAL Experimental Arts (1992), Contemporary Art Exhibition of the Non-Aligned Countries (1995); while attempting to unravel Indonesia’s so-called national history through its visual representations.

Tom Nicholson (b. Australia, 1973) is an artist of Irish and British descent who lives in Naarm/Melbourne. He was trained in drawing, a medium which he has used to think the relationships between between propositions and monuments, and between writing and images. He has made a number of works engaging aspects of Australia’s colonial histories and realities, often articulating these in relation to the histories and realities of other places. His work is often structured by drawing – as a system of traces, and as a way of imagining unrealised ideas and forms – across projects that encompass monuments and counter-monuments, photography and writing, posters, mosaic, artist’s books, stained glass, and large-scale charcoal drawings. His work with Hyphen— originates in 2015 when he began collaborating with Grace Samboh.

Nicholson’s recent work includes: Towards a glass monument (2019), a permanent stained glass window project for Melbourne University; Public meeting (2019), a survey of his work over twenty years at ACCA, Melbourne; Chimney in store (Towards a monument to Batman’s Treaty) (2022) a permanent public work in Batman Park in Melbourne co-commissioned by ACCA and the City of Melbourne. In 2018, Sternberg Press published the monograph Tom Nicholson: Lines towards another, edited by Amelia Barikin and Helen Hughes.

Ary “Jimged” Sendy (b. Jakarta, 1978) is drawn to settings that foster collaborative learning and the exchange of ideas, discussions, and self-reflection. He is convinced that the process of preserving and extending crucial insights or discoveries that emerge in these settings is of utmost importance, as it enables these valuable conversations and perspectives to have a more profound impact. Consequently, he is deeply committed to the practice of recording, as it allows him to capture and document these precious dialogues and viewpoints. As a person who came of age after Indonesia’s 32-year authoritarian rule, he has a profound interest in celebrating and exploring a diverse range of historical narratives, those that are deliberately forgotten, concealed, or manipulated. He believes that by doing so, we can not only gain a deeper understanding of ourselves but also pave the way for fresh ideas to shape our future.

Some of his exhibitions and projects include Tritangtu in documenta fifteen together with storyteller artists from Aceh, Agus Nur Amal PM TOH (Kassel, 2022); Jakarta Biennale 2021: ESOK; Migration: Speaking Nearby (Asia Culture Center, Gwangju, 2019); Voices from an Archived Silence (Theater Basel, Switzerland, 2019); OK Pangan: OK Video-Indonesia Media Arts Festival (Gudang Sarinah Ekosistem, Jakarta, 2017); What Does Art Do? (with Julia Sarisetiati)(Gwangju Biennale, South Korea, 2016); 125,660 Specimens of Natural History (Galeri Salihara, Jakarta, 2015); Post-Psychedelia (Selasar Sunaryo Art Space, Bandung, 2010). His latest solo exhibition was in RUBANAH Underground Hub, Jakarta, titled Daur Amanat (Inherited Order, 2018-2019).

Aufa Ariaputra (b. Jakarta, 1982) is a sound recordist who graduated from the Institut Kesenian Jakarta (Jakarta Institute of Arts) who truly believes that sound, like spirit, has the unique ability to allow us to enjoy without having to touch, to agree without having to see, to move without any physical trigger nor any visibility. For Aufa, sound is a bridge that connects the tangible world with the invisible world, helping us to feel its profound reality. Aufa believes that there is no sound that cannot be recorded and that all living things–humans, animals, plants–are equipped with inbuilt technology within their bodies that enables communication through sound. His belief is linked to our natural ability as humans to record billions of sounds from the time we are in the womb. He believes that it is no coincidence that so many sounds have been immortalised in the oldest religious scriptures.

Besides being a sound recordist for films, such as Foxtrot Six (2019), Laura & Marsha (2013), and Fiksi (2008), he is also the lead singer of the band That’s Rockefeller (since 2000). With Soundroll Indonesia, he has worked on the sound recording of his friends’ art projects, including Kapitalisme Bunyi (with Paul Kadarisman, et al., 2006), Ngobryls online talk show (with Jimmy Multhazam, Ricky Malau, et al., since 2011), and Possibilities of owning others’ texts (with Ary “Jimged” Sendy, Julia Sarisetiati, et al., 2019). Aufa also enjoys sharing his knowledge, methods, and strategies of sound recording through workshops and various forms of classes.

Nasikin (b. Tulungagung, 1993) is a sculptor who grew up in a tumpangsari (intercropping) farming culture. He admires how various types of living things can establish relationships in harmony with their living space, with nature, with the universe. When agriculture was industrialised, and farming culture was forced to become a monoculture, Nasikin witnessed the emergence of new creatures that were considered dangerous and threatening to the sustainability of agriculture. These creatures were immediately condemned as pests. In fact, in tumpangsari agriculture, the term pest is not known. In recent years, Nasikin’s thoughts, concerns and works have revolved around new creatures that can be considered a direct result of modernisation, industrialisation and the capitalisation of agriculture.

During his study in the Sculpture Department at Institut Seni Indonesia (Indonesia Arts Institute) Yogyakarta, Nasikin actively conducted workshops on batik-making with natural dyes and explored various art media, both natural and industrial. In the latter stages of his studies, he became vastly interested in clay, a longing that dates back to the age of five when he was taken by his parents to do some gardening. Nasikin navigates the tension of changing from the everyday to the industrial through various intermedia experimentations.

EXHIBITIONS

• [GROUP EXHIBITION] Voice Against Reason, MACAN Museum (Jakarta, Indonesia),18 November 2023 – 14 April 2024