Diyanto's Profile

Diyanto's exhibtion Halaman Terbakar (Burning Spaces)
February 2002, Selasar Sunaryo Art Space (Bandung)

Sensus non est inferendus sed efferendus

Agung Hujatnikajennong
Kurator Pameran

I.

Many artists, or particularly painters, used to believe that any colors they stroke and scratch on canvas is a reflection of their soul, of their artistic spirit, of their personal concern or of other things realized as something subjective, as if all of their ideas are origin, coming from the heart, trembling and exploding from within, just like the eruption of volcano that keeps hidden power. Through such premises, the myth of ‘expression', ‘emotion' and ‘inner scene' find the context in the discourse of painting. Other terms that don't relate with the subjective intention are usually considered as disturbing the essence of the work, totality and the autonomy of the ideas.

Soliter-Solider (Solitude-Solidarity)

However, in one of his essays on Diyanto, Indonesian poet Afrizal Malna has cited about the logic, which is in fact contradictory to such assumptions above. In the process of making his paintings, as he put it, instead of practicing the ‘self-expression', Diyanto used to follow the logic of ‘footnote', namely by working through the conjecture of connection he build with other works, such as poetry and theater plays. The connections of his works with other texts have not been hidden, on the contrary, he intends to show them clearly, for instance by putting verbal words on his paintings.¹⁾  

 However, the appearance of fonts on his canvas is not intended to be something that functions as verbal explanation of the works or vice versa, rather, as visual element that hold the same position with lines, form, textures and colors on the paintings. They perform to build a setting of texts that respectively relates one to another. In Diyanto's paintings the connection of the texts is built distortedly, incomplete, even sometimes in disorder.²⁾ This setting of text seems to demand the viewers to construct them in their own consciousness. Here Diyanto seems to reject assumption on the ‘purity of ideas', which is usually considered essential and autonomous from other correlated texts. On the contrary, on his paintings the signification of the texts quoted from many sources is believed to build possibility to express the self.³⁾

II.

Diyanto has explored the medium of painting since 1981. Since he was a student, his paintings have almost showed strong figurative tendency. His paintings often explore human gestures that signify certain symbolization. Something that is most recognizable in his paintings is his manner of creating ideas with layers of symbols. His works are full with metaphors, just like poetry.

His association with Indonesian theatre and literature circles, playwrights and writers—as he himself completely realizes—indeed gives strong influence in his career as artist. Even, in some of his earlier artistic periods, his paintings often showed fragments, scenes or theatrical performances that he retook symbolically. Some essays on Diyanto have cited the relationship of his works with the genre of ‘absurd theater', besides Afrizal Malna's ‘dark poetry'. In the middle of 90s decade Diyanto also worked with installations, and has been known as one of artists who pioneered its emergence in Indonesia. Although he used medium that is different with the paintings he used to work with, his installations have also been done with the same manner of creating art, that is by consuming texts of poetry and theater plays.

Diyanto's mindfulness ‘to consume the text' is probably something that is most important to discuss about the works he has done in his whole artistic career. In his paintings, the appearance of human figures, both completely or distortedly, are generated not through mimetic resemblance of the origin reality. Rather, they refer to some existing and established texts. Diyanto's full and total comprehension toward mysteries, panic, chaos and struggle represented through gestures of human on his paintings are generated from the process of identifying the language, namely through poetry and theaters.⁴⁾  Here, ‘language' is probably best understood as the ‘modus operandi' of the way we exist, and a shape that embraces all of the constitution about this world.

The poetry and theater plays, along with Diyanto's comprehension, then becomes a mediator that ‘negotiates' his paintings and reality. The distance between his works and the (social) reality represented in common understanding is something he confessed personally. He realizes that trough language there is a transformation of reality since through mediation of language reality actually presents in its incomplete shape. As he put it in his statement dated in 2000: “My expression is not neutral from any real images, although they are not clear visual guidance about my perception on reality. For me, the tension between building representation and performing expression is a significant barrier… it is not an invitation toward the certainty of representation on reality, rather it is hoped to be an open text to interpretation. Their presence as context releases its chain as the second reality (of literatures, myths and theater).” ⁵⁾

III.

In this “Burning Spaces” exhibition, 18 works of Diyanto are shown which show his recent artistic exploration done in 2001 up to 2002. Although he still uses the manner of consuming texts, now Diyanto seems to attempt to explore the possibilities of consuming other texts outside poetry and theater, namely by quoting some fragments he found on newspaper and other things whatsoever. He painted the images back in different sizes, and juxtaposed them with other texts. Here the risk of discontinuity, alienation or mistakes in grasping Diyanto's works is something he is speculating. Therefore, the intention to reinterpret or to reconstruct the texts in his works is needed in order to get a clear coherence with reality.

The work entitled “Soliter-Solider” (“Solitude-Solidarity”, acrylic on canvas, cloth, diptych, 2002), for instance, is shaped by two canvases combined to each other. Each part has different source of reference. On the left canvas is portrayed a woman figure sitting solitarily, as if waiting for something that would never show up. While on the right canvas is shown a piece of cloth with lines of repetitive pattern of fonts or words. On the middle part of the cloth is put a smaller square of canvas portraying a stone. In this work Diyanto tends to combine two representation that do not have a clear signifying correlation one to another, even contradict to each other. Diyanto presents at the same time two representations that actually stand in binary opposition. menghadirkan secara bersamaan dua citraan yang sebetulnya berada dalam oposisi biner: the image of solitary represented by the woman's private space and the repetition of words that signifies ‘noise'. Without intending to give emphasis to one of the images, Diyanto present them as two texts that assign supposition of association, interact and create many impressions and meanings one to another. The meaning of this work could be the vague border between private space and public space.

In this exhibition, some of Diyanto's works showing figures, both male or female, are intentionally quoting some fragments he found and took from ads and photographs, which sometimes have been chosen arbitrarily. This tendency is clearly shown on the work called “Paradoks” (“Paradox”, acrylic on canvas, cloth, diptych, 2002). Nowadays, amid such rapid growth of information and digital reproduction technology, our surrounding environment is encircled by many images, such as newspaper ads, magazine, billboards at the edge of the streets, banners, flyers, etc., that construct our understanding toward reality. They grow quickly and influence many people. This could be a reason why Diyanto tend to leave poetry and theater as the source of his works. It could be said that nowadays those images indeed speak much and more comprehensively that poetry.

Impression on absurdity and discontinuity also appear on other works such as “Semangka yang Dikuburkan” (“Buried Watermelon”, acrylic on canvas, 2002), “Bulan dalam Baskom” (“The Moon in the Basin”, acrylic on canvas, 2002), also “Panorama Akar Rumput” (“The Grassroots Panorama”, acrylic and mixed media on canvas, 2001-2002). Besides, Diyanto still tends to explore the problem of conflicts in the social life: norms, sexuality, taboo and abnormality. See for instance “Samagaha” (“Eclipse”, acrylic on canvas, 2002).

The phrase “Burning Space” as the title of the exhibition is intended as Diyanto's metaphor on his panic feeling over the visual power of crucial reality. ⁶⁾ “Burning Space” is an alarming expression of chaotic feeling caused by reality that is not completely represented through language. Witnessing the ‘burning space' is like to comprehend the vanishing parts of reality and incomplete process of understanding the reality itself, particularly because reality is always constructed by and trough language.

                                                                                                   Gegerkalong, January 2002

__________

Notes:

1)       This is such a famous credo of Emilio Betti on interpretation: “Meaning is not taken from the conclusion, rather, it has to be interpreted.” See Josef Bleicher, “Contemporary Hermeneutics”, London, Keegan & Paul, 1980. Concerning Diyanto's works, which are full of opened texts, it is important to consider the process of interpretation most significant in understanding this exhibition.

2)       See “Kisah Menanam Footnote di Tepi Sungai” by Afrizal Malna, in an introduction to Diyanto's solo exhibition “Put-Not” in Solo (1994), p. 3.

2)   Ibid.

3)       See Diyanto's statement in an interview with Eddy Purnawady, “Mencari Peluang Menyatakan Diri” (“In Search of the Possibility of Expressing the Self”) in Pikiran Rakyat daily newspaper, December 31, 1996: “…Things that related to parallel experience, be it come from my experience in theatre, through the way I consume the texts, objects, or my involvement in social problems, deserved to intervene, in a sense that they tend to work together with myself …”. Julia Kristeva calls this relationship of texts as intertextuality, namely a network consisting many texts, which are plural and come from many different sources, interacting dynamically one to another in a dialogue. See Julia Kristeva, “Revolution in Poetic Language”, Columbia University Press, 1989.  

4)       Rizki A. Zaelani on Diyanto, in “Figur di Abad Baru” (“The Figure of New Century”), Edwin Gallery exhibition catalogue, 2-13 August 2000, p. 5.

5)       See Diyanto's statement, “Undangan Lalat” (“Invitation of Flies”) exhibition catalogue, Koong Gallery, Jakarta, 8-17 June 2000.

6)       See artist's statement in this catalogue.

Diyanto...

Finding subjectivity and knowing the primordial layers of my ideas and the world of my surrounding objects, for me, is neither such a protection toward assumptions or belief on hidden reality, on the "existence" or "˜have existed". It is also not such an elimination of primary intrusion between "creating images" and "showing expression", rather, it is merely an effort of mobilizing my imagination.

Carrying out the process of reception, for me, is not merely realized as aesthetic encounter. Rather, it deals with how to face the visual domination of crucial reality, like witnessing a "˜burning space": experiencing the state of emergency in my mind, in my private and non-private zone. Trying to avoid absolute experience there, while at the same time, trying to view in and out, means facing the risk of discontinuity, ambiguity, mistakes and even absurdity.