JAKARTA BIENNALE 2021: ESOK (TOMORROW) Part 2
By: B.T.
February 10th, 2022
Upon arriving at the Museum of National Awakening, also known as Stovia, I was intrigued by the layout of the stage placed outdoors in the middle of the park, like a spirit and hope that tries to embrace nature, free environment, and outdoor activities that were temporarily taken away from urban people’s lives due to the pandemic.
The second installment at Stovia marked the opening of the Jakarta Biennale 2021: Tomorrow event. We then listened carefully to the opening words from the host, stating that the Jakarta Biennale is a biennial art exhibition first held in 1974, initiated by the Jakarta Art Council under the name of the Grand Indonesia Painting Exhibition, and then became an international-scale exhibition in 2009. The event always strives to create a creative, participatory, and collaborative urban space for its citizens to enliven the dynamics of the city’s culture and economy.
Quoting from Dolorosa Sinaga during the opening event, the Artistic Director of Jakarta Biennale 2021: Tomorrow, “Stovia is important because it shows that the Indonesian people also want to progress, which then became the seed of the UI medical school. The essence of this awakening is how we shape the future, and we must move forward. That is the essence of my writing (Dolorosa) at the National Museum. For the future, critical thinking about the present is necessary for a better future.”
With such thought-provoking opening remarks, we were eager to explore this second venue. We wanted to see and experience the atmosphere of the tomorrow that Jakarta Biennale seeks to build.
The first room we explored was the multifunctional learning space of the Krabstadt Education Center, inspired by the pretzel, a staple food of the inhabitants of Krabstadt, a fictional territory in the Arctic region where unwanted people from Nordic countries are exiled. The KEC space can be used by other Biennale participants to hold workshops and educational programs. Next, there was a single-channel video work by Amsterdam-based artist Praneet Soi, titled “Migration of Form,” which highlights the distortions caused by political upheavals, media roles, and patterns of world population migration. Through his work, he tries to respond to the socio-political conditions around him as someone who has moved from Bengal to the United States and now resides in the Netherlands.
In the next room we entered, there was a three-channel video installation by London-based artist Erika Tan titled “Amok: Koma.” She collaborated with five female artists from Jakarta who are members of the Dan(s)ity art group, namely Althea Sri Bestari, Chyntia Arnella, Florentina Windy, Nudiandra Sarasvati, and Yola Yulfianti. We were immersed in the atmosphere created by the five women, dressed in traditional sarongs and batik cloth, trying to absorb their movements as they danced and swayed to keep the water waves in a bowl with their own unique styles, using their heads, hands, stomachs, thighs, and even feet. However, although we were impressed by the determination of the artists, we had some regrets and suggestions when trying to understand the essence and appreciate this work, if the viewing distance to the television monitor where the video installation was set up were not too far and the font size used in the video could be enlarged, we might have gone home with a different feeling.
Next, we entered a small room located in the northwest direction from the Jakarta Biennale opening stage. There, a film titled “Mencitra Bara Mewarta Wabah” was playing and we happened to meet and hear a direct explanation from the artist who created the work. His name was Rizki Lazuardi from Bandung. Rizki created a work that he called a speculative fragment of a Dutch government film made in 1927 about the eradication of the plague in 1910 in East Java, which was actually done by relocating village residents and burning the houses they left behind. However, in the film made 17 years later, the burning incident was not included because the Dutch government did not want to set a bad precedent in the future. This is where Rizki’s role comes in. Instead of rewriting history, as an artist, he renewed it with research data and tried to create his own version of the film based on actual data and facts by adding fragments of the burning of houses through digital engineering on other old films that he found and tried to bring a new nuance to the Dutch government’s plague eradication film, which did not truly depict the actual events.
Finally, we approached Maharani Mancanagara’s “Susur Leluri”. This work is a card game in which Maharani invites players to, in her own words, “…re-meaning historical narratives through an intersection between facts that have become ‘history’, and the values of life she encounters through the history of someone in her close environment,” through a story where she provides 3 alternative endings to the plot. Maharani’s works explore histories in Indonesia, from the past to the present, which she bases on her personal and familial experiences. With this background, she developed an interest in visualizing the long history of events in 1965 in Indonesia. These events became the funnel for Maharani to voice her artistry, a path she chose to recognize herself and which she hopes can help more people with the same background as victims of history to gain recognition.
We enjoyed the vibrancy and enthusiasm of the art world that seemed to be reborn, where honest thoughts can finally meet again in physical space. After the difficult times caused by the uncertainty arising from the ongoing pandemic, this slight relaxation can accommodate that. Welcome back Jakarta Biennale, because TOMORROW is hope.