Entering through a darkened passageway, visitors emerge to face a vibrant graphite and resin installation by Entang Wiharso featuring a group of frozen life-size figures — actually Indonesia’s current and former presidents — and a gateway of tangled, chaotic forms in relief.

The piece is one of five artworks by five Indonesian artists to show at the Indonesia Pavilion at the 2013 Venice Biennale, which runs from June 1 to Nov. 24. On Saturday in Jakarta, the pavilion’s organizers unveiled a preview of the space, the exhibition room designed by a local architect and interior designer and the artworks on display as they will be in Venice.

The country’s foray at possibly the world’s most important art event is particularly meaningful this year, for the pavilion will be situated at the biennale’s central Arsenale site for the first time.

Curator Carla Bianpoen told The Jakarta Post, “The Indonesia National Pavilion on 500 square meters in the Arsenale is a huge step. We hope to show that Indonesia is taking its place and of equal footing on the global map … The artworks will denote how Indonesia is repositioning itself amidst the ever-increasing global forces of today, and it is hoped that the world will take due note.”

Restrained: Sri Astari’s Pendopo: Dancing the Wild Seas is one of five artworks to show at the upcoming Venice Biennale, and features seven elegant wayang figures as bedoyo dancers in a specially constructed Javanese pendopo. The figures are made of wood with leather for the upper body, and the garments are steel mesh. (JP/P.J. Leo)With the theme of sakti for the art the country is offering up, the exhibit’s works embody the term that can mean power, divine energy, creative force, magic, charisma and much more.

From the Muslim, Christian and Hindu iconography on Entang’s entryway and his representations of political figures — according to tradition those in power considered to possess sakti — to the restrained incarnation produced by Sri Astari in her wayang figures poised in a Javanese pendopo, the Indonesia Pavilion resonates with varying interpretations of the evocative word.

Albert Yonathan Setyawan said his artwork, 1,200 simple stupa-inspired ceramic figurines set in a labyrinth pattern on the floor, relates to sakti as the piece references the process of enlightenment and the universal human condition.

“I tried to mix [the stupa shapes and pattern] with the idea of the theme of sakti, the transformative energy. For me the process of transformation has to start from the self, from the human self, and I’m trying to connect also with the idea of spirituality outside the boundaries of institutionalized religion,” he told the Post of his work titled Cosmic Labyrinth: The Silent Path.

For Entang, who said he had been focusing on creating The Indonesian: No Time to Hide for a year, sakti has to do with both the individual and the universal, while also articulating the country’s diversity.

Enlightened: Albert Yonathan Setiawan’s Cosmic Labyrinth: The Silent Path, shown on Saturday in Jakarta at an exclusive preview, will be on show at the Indonesia Pavilion at the 55th Venice Biennale. (JP/P.J. Leo)
“That’s why I created a very massive and quite personal [work] and also at the same time very universal … It’s about the complexity, so I wanted to capture that condition, to present Indonesia from not only one perspective but many,” he told the Post.

The concept of sakti is echoed in the music created specially for the pavilion by composer Rahayu Supanggah. The quiet, peculiar arrangement of deep gongs, whistling and wind, and the tings of gamelan instruments and birds, with the occasional burst of energy, contributes to the aura of reflection the space engenders, offering a version of sakti in soundscape.

Titarubi’s Shadow of Surrender stands silent and eerie after entering the pavilion space through Entang’s gate, a preternatural work of nine school desks made of burnt wood, oversized books atop each filled with blank pages. Carla said the wood was reclaimed from colonial-era railroad tracks, and the pieces are burnt in a reference to the charcoal the artist’s mother used to cook with. The background features massive images of trees, Titarubi’s sakti relating to both education and the environment, to knowledge and the natural world.

“Every artist was free to interpret sakti according to their own liking and personal experience, and apply their characteristic art practice. Interestingly, [Sri] Astari who comes from the Javanese cultural background where sakti is inherent, and Albert Yonathan who comes from Bandung, West Java, and just turned 30, are in the similar wave of spiritual transformation, by seeking to go within the self. Astari finding the power of sakti within the soul, Albert through the silent path of meditation in the labyrinth. Titarubi finds the power in knowledge, while Eko [Nugroho] and Entang look at the nation and how it survives against all odds,” Carla said.

Silent: Titarubi’s Shadow of Surrender features school desks made of burnt wood framed by large black and white images of the forest. (Courtesy of Yusi Avianto Pareanom, Indonesia Pavilion – Venice Biennale)
Eko’s work, placed next to Sri Astari’s Pendopo: Dancing the Wild Seas and its elegant conjuring of the Goddess of the South Sea through its figures in a bedoyo dance, stands in rather disjointed contrast, yet also rooted in oceanic symbolism.

The artist presents a bamboo raft sitting pointedly upon used Pertamina barrels, with cartoonish, colorful figures afloat on an absent ocean. Titled Instigator of Storms, the work speaks of Indonesia’s continuing — and very modern — troubles and uncertainties.

Carla said of the Venice Biennale, “It is a place where the world is gathered.” For the 55th iteration of the event, countries such as the Maldives, Iraq and Kosovo will be showing for the first time, along with
the Holy See.

Albert said of his invitation to show his art in Venice, “It’s a privilege for me, a special opportunity, to be a part of this, to represent Indonesia.”

Known as the site where the future of art is exhibited every two years, Indonesia’s presence in Venice will be a “milestone”, as the pavilion’s producer, Restu Imansari Kusumaningrum, put it.