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Super Baday Fitness Center takes Ruci Art Space by storm
Super Baday features fitness equipment that use clay roof tiles instead of cast iron for its weights.
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Ruci Art Space is transformed into Super Baday Fitness Center (JP/Erica Fransisca Thajeb)
O
ne day prior to Indonesia’s 74th Independence Day, flower boards stood by the entrance to a building known as the Ruci Art Space on Jl. Suryo in South Jakarta.
The boards conveyed congratulations on the establishment of the Super Baday Fitness Center, leading to curiosity as to what it actually was, where it might be located inside Ruci’s building, and what would happen to the art space now if there was a fitness center.
Upon entering the building, a sign for Super Baday points up the stairway to the art space, and the gym is finally revealed.
Unlike the gyms we urbanites are familiar with, Super Baday features fitness equipment using clay roof tiles instead of cast iron as weights. The fitness center, a complete transformation of the Ruci Art Space, is the manifestation of Julian “Togar” Abraham’s latest solo exhibition, titled Ulah Tanah (Mischievous Earth) and slated to run until Sept. 15.
Ulah Tanah is the culmination of a vested interest in the Jatiwangi Cup, an annual bodybuilding competition for roof tile factory workers in the Jatiwangi subdistrict of Majalengka regency, West Java.
For the past five years, Togar, along with curators Grace Samboh and Arief Yudi Rahman, had been visiting Jatiwangi to watch the contest, held every mid-August to commemorate Independence Day.
They were amazed by the muscular bodies of the roof tilers and their ability to lift as well as carefully handle the easily breakable tiles. Eventually, the three of them wanted to see what would happen if they brought the spirit of the Jatiwangi Cup to a new geographical and cultural scene.
Togar said at the exhibition opening that contenders in the bodybuilding contest were muscular because they worked with soil.
“I want to present what happens [in Jatiwangi] in a more urban setting, in which there is no obligation to work [to make the tiles], where people can just come to one place, [to] exercise, so that their bodies could become toned as well because of working with soil, but the process is different,” said Togar.
The team at Ruci Art Space, having experienced firsthand the euphoria and passion of Togar’s vision, took the opportunity to realize the exhibition with confidence.
Illustrating the extent of their confidence, the team didn’t request any blueprint of Togar’s artwork. The first time they saw the installations was when the materials were shipped two weeks prior to the exhibition opening.
Ruci Art Space director Rio Pasaribu said he truly believed Togar had a mission bigger than himself, and that whatever the outcome was, it would be important.
“We don’t want to perceive with logic, we want people to feel. Even during the process of transforming Ruci into this temporary gym, we felt the same happiness that people had over Jatiwangi Cup,” Rio told The Jakarta Post.
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Rio recalled his conversation with Grace, discussing an episode of the Jatiwangi Cup, where people who usually carry roof tiles have to put away the roof tiles for a while, to take the stage and pose under spotlights.
“When we imagine a bodybuilder, we think of masculinity. But the winners of the Jatiwangi Cup, they’re just normal guys,” said Grace, adding that the bodybuilders were regular family men with average posture who happened to have great bodies because of their hard work hauling roof tiles.
As the bodybuilders are immortalized in photos displayed on the walls of the Super Baday Fitness Center, visitors to the Ulah Tanah exhibition – some may be used to working out in the gym and known as celebrities with enviable toned bodies – might be tempted to try out the ‘fitness equipment’ as in lifting the roof tiles.
Aside from being an art installation, Ulah Tanah is an intriguing experiment to see how people would react to the transformed narration of the Jatiwangi Cup.
Ruci has invited celebrities and fitness influencers to test out the new space before the exhibition’s opening date.
“They’re really excited about this,” said Rio, hoping that other visitors could feel the same and interact with the artworks.
Another part of Ulah Tanah not to be missed is a room that takes visitors to a Jatiwangi body builder’s living quarters, where there are posters, calendars and other objects related to the famed contest.
