The night before yesterday I came home very late. At Taman Budaya Yogyakarta (TBY) has been an exibition organized by Srikandi. Srikandi is the women students organization who study at the Indonesian Art Institute (ISI) Yogyakarta. There are 104 participants whose art work are being exibited at TBY.
Then the night they did the seminar on the theme of Women in Art Contemporary. Actually the theme of exibition is "Menolak Malu" (rejection of Shame).
Talking little bit about shame "malu" in Indonesian culture has lots of meanings. "Malu" has both positive and negative meaning.Positive quality asociates with the idea of empathy which shows a person's tolerance to others. The negative quality refers to the understanding that an individual does not have her/his place to be the person they want to look like.
Let me give you an example on our current situation. Fews days ago a national legislator from the Muslim Party, PKS was caught by a reporter to be watching a pornograhy film while he was at the "paripurna" (general assembly) meeting. To make the story shortens, his action was seen as a deep "malu" for all PKS people. PKS's constituents even were threat to take their support from this party in the 2014's national election. PKS stands for Party of Justice and Prosperity. This is the party which played an important roles to pass the national law of pornography and pornoaction.
English speaking distinguishes between shy and shame. Our "malu" can be explained to describe both meanings in English, shy and shame depending into the context.
Well I have to just telling what was very interesting in the discussion as a speaker who was asked to talk on the feminism in the women artists's work. My talk was about how women's giving the birth to the art. It was very interesting in understanding women's mind, body's limitation and the environmental supporting to the process. My experiences worked with 11 women to produce the exibition last February was the centre of my talk. Women have their own questions and trying to answer it while processing their work of art. I do not have time to explain in detail because I want to go to the same process I have seen in the work of Tita Rubi who was at the panel with me.
She shared deeply about her transfomation of thought to produce a high international art. I have lived in her stories but due to my other work, I have to wait explaining deeply on what was happening with her thought to produce such of great work. Being now...I just share some of my thoughts.
Relating to the culture of ashame, one thing that was very interesting to think on the pornography was that number of women's artists in the world perhaps is only about 25-30%, But there are so many concentration on the body of women created by male artists. So, Tita Rubi was asked by the national galery in Singapore to fill in the space in the exibition room. She was shock at the time because of her feeling as a small person whose identity as a woman who is aware about herself as a product from the postcolonial experiences. Her consciousness was very strong to realise that her art work will be exibited at this galary which was a colonial building.
She wondered how could she respond to the challenges. This innerconflict gave a birth on her work to think of making the reproduction of the statue of David which was created by Michaelangelo. She came to this decision by processing her feeling of "malu" and questioned it. Why women do not feel ashame to see their own body but will not be able to do the same think to the body of men?
It was five month works that created lots of reflection on herself. I will explore deeply on my site of blog which is titled Women's artist giving birth to art. However in this my discussion I learn so much on the process behind the stage of an international women artist from Indonesia. I proud of her who overcome her "malu" by making the statue of David which are similar in its origin which I saw in Florence, Italy, but there are so many symbolic meaning sprang out from the giant David at the galary.
To strengthen herself of being an Indonesian who is proud of her ancestral skill on batik, she applied the batik motive and gave the color of red to the body of David. She got back her confidence and pride to be Indonesian person, a Muslim artist who was not afraid to reflect on the body of the prophet of David according to the teaching of Islam.
It was a good night for me driving home at the midnight quiet road to rethink about our contruction of the body....thanks mba Tita Rubi....
http://arttitudes.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/216.jpg
Then the night they did the seminar on the theme of Women in Art Contemporary. Actually the theme of exibition is "Menolak Malu" (rejection of Shame).
Talking little bit about shame "malu" in Indonesian culture has lots of meanings. "Malu" has both positive and negative meaning.Positive quality asociates with the idea of empathy which shows a person's tolerance to others. The negative quality refers to the understanding that an individual does not have her/his place to be the person they want to look like.
Let me give you an example on our current situation. Fews days ago a national legislator from the Muslim Party, PKS was caught by a reporter to be watching a pornograhy film while he was at the "paripurna" (general assembly) meeting. To make the story shortens, his action was seen as a deep "malu" for all PKS people. PKS's constituents even were threat to take their support from this party in the 2014's national election. PKS stands for Party of Justice and Prosperity. This is the party which played an important roles to pass the national law of pornography and pornoaction.
English speaking distinguishes between shy and shame. Our "malu" can be explained to describe both meanings in English, shy and shame depending into the context.
Well I have to just telling what was very interesting in the discussion as a speaker who was asked to talk on the feminism in the women artists's work. My talk was about how women's giving the birth to the art. It was very interesting in understanding women's mind, body's limitation and the environmental supporting to the process. My experiences worked with 11 women to produce the exibition last February was the centre of my talk. Women have their own questions and trying to answer it while processing their work of art. I do not have time to explain in detail because I want to go to the same process I have seen in the work of Tita Rubi who was at the panel with me.
She shared deeply about her transfomation of thought to produce a high international art. I have lived in her stories but due to my other work, I have to wait explaining deeply on what was happening with her thought to produce such of great work. Being now...I just share some of my thoughts.
Relating to the culture of ashame, one thing that was very interesting to think on the pornography was that number of women's artists in the world perhaps is only about 25-30%, But there are so many concentration on the body of women created by male artists. So, Tita Rubi was asked by the national galery in Singapore to fill in the space in the exibition room. She was shock at the time because of her feeling as a small person whose identity as a woman who is aware about herself as a product from the postcolonial experiences. Her consciousness was very strong to realise that her art work will be exibited at this galary which was a colonial building.
She wondered how could she respond to the challenges. This innerconflict gave a birth on her work to think of making the reproduction of the statue of David which was created by Michaelangelo. She came to this decision by processing her feeling of "malu" and questioned it. Why women do not feel ashame to see their own body but will not be able to do the same think to the body of men?
It was five month works that created lots of reflection on herself. I will explore deeply on my site of blog which is titled Women's artist giving birth to art. However in this my discussion I learn so much on the process behind the stage of an international women artist from Indonesia. I proud of her who overcome her "malu" by making the statue of David which are similar in its origin which I saw in Florence, Italy, but there are so many symbolic meaning sprang out from the giant David at the galary.
To strengthen herself of being an Indonesian who is proud of her ancestral skill on batik, she applied the batik motive and gave the color of red to the body of David. She got back her confidence and pride to be Indonesian person, a Muslim artist who was not afraid to reflect on the body of the prophet of David according to the teaching of Islam.
It was a good night for me driving home at the midnight quiet road to rethink about our contruction of the body....thanks mba Tita Rubi....
http://arttitudes.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/10/216.jpg
