Bahtera Kaum Urban (Migrants'€™ Ark)

Repeated sounds of ship horns marked the opening of this year'€™s annual Yogyakarta art fair, or Art|Jog 13, at the Yogyakarta Cultural Center (TBY).

As the main doors of the exhibition were officially opened on Saturday evening last week, the visitors were welcomed into the building whose face has been transformed to look like a ship hull.

The image of a ship hull is built from joining metal strips from 360 old barrels, covering the front part of the cultural center, reflecting this year'€™s theme: '€œMaritime Culture'€.

'€œThe theme was deliberately chosen as an entry to maritime that was very closely linked to the history of Indonesia and other countries having maritime territories,'€ said Art|Jog 13 curator Bambang Witjaksono.

'€œIn fact, it is because of this maritime culture that Indonesia has gained an important position in the current global development in the fields of both politics and economy, social and cultural,.'€

In the field of art, similarly, Indonesia has huge potential because of the abundant number of fine artists and exhibitions that are held every week and the artistic atmosphere that surrounds them.

'€œThis maritime culture and its various co-relations are all expected to be well represented in the works exhibited in Art|Jog 13,'€ Bambang said.

Upon arrival, after passing through two sets of reception desks, visitors are greeted with work by noted artist Entang Wiharso. Titled Borderless: Floating Islands, the work uses crushed bricks, resin, steel and graphite. The work comprises three connected-floating islands on each of which Entang portrays the alienation of people despite the link between them. Entang said this is what Indonesia has become under generations of poor leadership.

Right next to the installation is a mural work by Farhan Siki titled Manuscript of the Seducers, depicting the history of trade in the archipelagic country.

Pesisir (Coast).
Across the mural, there is another installation by artist Eddi Prabandono entitled Pesisir (Coast), a speedboat modified from an upside down VW Beetle. According to the artist, the work is inspired by the fact that two-thirds of Indonesian territory is sea but the potentials have yet to be explored optimally for the benefit of the people.

The fact that only some 1 percent of the Indonesian population still hold onto maritime'€™s culture further inspired him.

'€œPesisir'€ is a call to return to the sea just like what our ancestors had done centuries ago. The land has been too crowded to move. We have to control our own sea for the wealth of Indonesia,'€ Eddi explained his working concept.

Still in the same room, the art fair'€™s smallest work of a 7-by-7-by-7 cm by noted artist Tita Rubi is also displayed. The work is named The Golden Nutmeg, as it is made of nutmeg with gold plating.

After this room, visitors are guided through the labyrinth-like path along which all the exhibited works are displayed.

Among them include the works by artist couple Erika Ernawan and Erik Pauhrizi'€™s See through Rose-Colored Glasses, an installation made of embroidery, sands, resin and cooper. The artists said the work was inspired by the uncontrolled logging of protected forests in Indonesia to be
converted into oil palm plantations that had made the country the world'€™s biggest palm oil producer.

However, the price for the progress is extensive. Indonesia has lost a large part of its protected forests, making it one of the countries with the highest level of forest damage in the world.

The couple said they took the title from a quote by an Austrian princess and famous socialite, Pauline Metternich, who once said, '€œI was young ['€¦] and I saw everything though rose-colored glasses'€. The artists did so to interpret human'€™s blindness in seeing the reality of their actions.

'€œThe idiom also refers to the failed situation of being freed from the negative aspect of knowledge in which there is always a perception that seeing conditions in a comfortable corner always ends up in a utopia situation,'€ said Erika.

World without Sea.
In all there are 158 works by 115 participating artists on display. They comprise 58 paintings, 24 installation works, nine videos, nine sculptures, two kinetic arts and a mural. The rest are photographic work presented by 12 art photographers.

Indonesian participants mostly come from Yogyakarta (82) and Jakarta (12). Others come from Bandung (West Java), Bali, Surakarta (Central Java), Semarang (Central Java) and Magelang (also Central Java). Foreign participants have come from Australia, Malaysia, Japan and the US.

Three of the participating artists aged less than 33 years have been selected by the art fair'€™s juror team to accept the Young Artist Awards, the first ever given during the six years of Art|Jog, which was initially named Jogja Arts Fair (JAF).

Apart from receiving cash, recipients of the awards are also eligible for a residency program at the Starke Foundation in Berlin, Germany.

Although the event is held as Muslims all over the world are entering the Ramadhan fasting month, visitors are still seen flocking the exhibition venue every day. The exhibition opens daily from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.

'€œWe had some 10,000 visitors at the opening ceremony and have been receiving some 900 of them daily after that,'€ Art|Jog 13 communication and publication officer Hamada Adzani said.

Lazuardi, one of the visitor, said that he had been following the event for the last three years and kept coming back to enjoy the displayed works of arts.

'€œThe works are really inspirational for me,'€ said Lazuardi, who is a college student.

The exhibition runs until July 20.

'€” Photos by Slamet Susanto