handiwirmandan benda-benda in-situ / and objects in-situ. “tak berakar tak berpucuk/ no roots no shoots” galeri nasional indonesia, 29 maret-5 april 2011 / the national gallery of indonesia march 29th-april 5th 2011

daftar isi / content

berjalan bersama / walking together—biantoro santoso6dari yang remeh-temeh, yang tersisa dan tersia-sia / from the trivial, debris and the wasted—enin supriyanto 10melampaui naturalisasi: yang akrab dan yang asing / beyond naturalization: the familiar and the foreign —agung hujatnikajennong 26benda-benda in-situ: tak berakar, tak berpucuk / objects in-situ: no roots, no shoots38riwayat hidup / curriculum vitae 74

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Kerjasama Handiwirman Saputra dengan Nadi Gallery telah terbina cukup lama. Kami mengawalinya dengan pameran tunggal Handiwirman: “Apa Apanya Dong” pada tahun 2004. Setelah itu, Nadi Gallery makin sering menampilkan karya-karyanya di berbagai acara pameran, baik di dalam negeri maupun di luar negeri (Singapore Show Case 2008, dan CIGE 2008 Beijing.)

Bagi saya karya-karya Handiwirman punya daya tarik yang kuat, karena ia selalu punya cara pandang khas terhadap hal-hal yang seringkali luput dari perhatian kita; untuk kemudian ia tampilkan dengan cara yang unik pula melalui karya-karyanya. Kekhasan karyanya juga berkaitan dengan bahan-bahan yang ia pakai: dari karet-busa sampai rambut, dari besi sampai kain, dan lain-lain. Berbagai jenis bahan itu selalu bisa ia olah sampai pada tampilan yang rinci, apik, memikat perhatian. Ia adalah seorang seniman yang tekun memikirkan berbagai aspek teknik produksi dan presentasi bagi tiap-tiap karyanya agar bisa menampung dan menghadirkan imajinasi dan gagasannya sesempurna mungkin.

Kali ini, setelah melalui persiapan yang cukup matang, kami hadirkan kembali sejumlah karya terbaru Handiwirman Saputra, hasil dari penjelajahannya ke arah yang makin luas dari karya-karya masa sebelumnya. Ini adalah babak baru dari suatu runtutan karya yang hendak ia kembangkan di masa mendatang.

Nadi Gallery has had a long collaboration with Handiwirman Saputra. We began it with Handiwirman’s solo exhibition, “Apa-apanya Dong”, in 2004. After that, Nadi Gallery has presented his works in many exhibitions, whether in Indonesia and abroad (Singapore Show Case, 2008, and CIGE 2008 Beijing).

To me, Handiwirman’s works exert a strong attraction because he always has a distinct point of view about things that often escape our attention; the things that he then re-presents in unique ways through his works. The distinct quality of his works is related to the materials he uses: from Styrofoam to hairs, from iron to fabric, etc. He can always process these materials to create detailed, beautiful, and eye-catching appearances. He is an artist who thoroughly thinks of the various production and presentation techniques for all his works so that they can best contain and convey his imaginations and ideas.

This time, after a thorough process of preparation, we again present Handiwirman Saputra’s latest works, the results of his explorations in more varied directions compared to his works in the past. This is a new stage for a series of works that he wishes to develop in the future.

In the preparation for today’s exhibition, I have been lucky to be able to follow and witness the intensity of Handiwirman Saputra’s creative work. The pictures of his works in the open

berjalan bersama / walking together—biantoro santoso

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Dalam persiapan pameran kali ini, saya beruntung bisa mengikuti dan menyaksikan intensitas kerja Handiwirman Saputra. Foto-foto karyanya yang hadir di alam terbuka—bagian terpadu dari pameran kali ini—adalah juga bagian dari intensitas kerja itu. Handiwirman memilih lokasi yang dianggapnya paling pas untuk masing-masing karya. Segala upaya ia tempuh agar karyanya bisa tampil di lokasi-lokasi itu.

Selain persiapan yang menguras tenaga semacam itu, saya juga terlibat dalam sejumlah pertemuan antara Handiwirman, Enin Supriyanto dan Agung Hujatnikajennong. Kami sering terlibat dalam obrolan, diskusi, dan perdebatan yang seru. Dari kesempatan-kesempatan ini saya dapat menyaksikan keuletan, keseriusan, serta ketelitian Handiwirman dalam setiap tahapan proses berkaryanya.

Pameran ini tidak akan terlaksana tanpa bantuan banyak pihak. Saya mengucapkan terimakasih kepada Handiwirman Saputra yang telah bekerja keras hingga pameran ini dapat terlaksana. Penghargaan juga saya sampaikan kepada Enin Supriyanto dan Agung Hujatnikajennong yang rajin berdialog dan berdiskusi dengan Handiwirman, hingga pameran ini bisa menemukan format, bentuk dan isi yang kokoh serta menarik. Terimakasih untuk Agung Sukindra dan Anan Prayz, dua orang fotografer yang telah bersedia menjadi rekan kerja Handiwirman, agar ia bisa mendapatkan foto-foto yang sesuai dengan gagasannya untuk pameran ini. Dan, akhirnya terimakasih juga kepada sahabat saya, Agus Suwage, yang telah bersedia membuka pameran ini.

nature—an integrated part of the exhibition today—also form a part of such intensity. Handiwirman chose the location that he considered the most suitable for each one of his works. He would do anything to make sure the work can find a place in such locations.

Apart from such an energy-consuming process of preparation, I was also involved in several meetings between Handiwirman, Enin Supriyanto, and Agung Hujatnikajennong. We were often engaged in lively discussions and debates. It is from such opportunities that I was able to witness Handiwirman’s thoroughness, seriousness, and meticulousness in every stage of his creative process.

The exhibition will not be possible without the help of many parties. I wish to thank Handiwirman Saputra who has worked so hard to make sure the exhibition can be held. I have the same real appreciation for Enin Supriyanto and Agung Hujatnikajennong who have been so thorough in conducting their dialogues and discussions with Handiwirman, and thus enable the exhibition to find interesting and strong format and content. I am grateful for Agung Sukindra and Anan Prayz, two photographers who have been willing to be Handiwirman’s partners, so that he could have the pictures that would be suitable with his ideas for this exhibition. I extend my gratitude also to my best buddy, Agus Suwage, who has been willing to open this exhibition.

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Semua ini bermula dari selembar foto, hasil jepretan kamera Handiwirman Saputra. Ia berikan foto ini kepada saya, dan juga kepada Agung Hujatnikajennong, dengan satu pesan yang sederhana dan jelas: “Pandanglah (foto ini)!”

Foto yang ia sodorkan menampilkan pemandangan yang amat biasa: aliran sungai kecil yang mengalirkan air yang tidak bisa dibilang jernih, dan sebentang bantaran sungai yang dipenuhi rumpun bambu di sana-sini. Permukaan tanah dan bebatuan di tepi sungai tampak lembab, basah, ditutupi lumut yang tampak hijau terang dibawah terpaan terang sinar matahari. Tepat di bagian tengah gambar foto itu, yang jadi pusat perhatian, tampak akar-akar pohon bambu yang menjuntai, sambil beberapa yang lebih panjang menjulur ke bawah, menembus permukaan air sungai.

Dan, karena air sungai yang tampaknya susut dari ketinggian normalnya, akar-akar yang biasanya tersembunyi di bawah permukaan air itu kini jadi terlihat jelas. Akar-akar itu tidak lagi tersembunyi di bawah air sungai yang keruh. Ia tidak lagi menyimpan rahasia: kini urat-urat nadinya tersingkap, terlihat. Pada sulur-sulur akar itu, berbagai barang, atau tepatnya, bekas dan sisa berbagai benda dan barang, tampak menempel atau tersangkut, melambai, menjuntai. Namun agak ke belakang, meski sudah tidak tertutup air, sebagian akar yang lain tetap tersembunyi di balik kegelapan.

It all began from a piece of photograph, which Handiwirman Saputra had taken using his camera. He gave the picture to me, as well as to Agung Hujatnikajennong, with one simple and clear message: “Look (at the picture)!”

The picture he presented to us showed a common view: a brook whose water is not at all clear, and a shoal with a bamboo grove. The soil and stone surfaces by the river appear damp, wet, covered with vivid green moss under the bright sunlight. Right in the middle of the picture, the focus of attention, one sees dangling roots, the longer one extending downward, piercing the river surface.

Because the water seems to be receding, the river surface lies lower than its normal height, and the roots that are commonly hidden under the water are now exposed. They are no longer concealed under the muddy water. The secret has been revealed: the filaments are now out in the open, visible. One can see a range of objects or, to be exact, ex-objects and remains of things and objects attached on to the roots, swaying and dangling. At the back, however, other roots remain concealed in the dark although they are no longer covered by the water.

The closer we observe all the details in the picture, the further we are taken into an enigmatic visual atmosphere. A riverbank panorama is quite common and mundane. Handiwirman’s request for us to take a look at it—instead of merely seeing

dari yang remeh-temeh, yang tersisa dan tersia-sia / from the trivial,debris and the wasted —enin supriyanto

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hanya serpihan dan cabikan yang tersangkut atau menjuntai lepas; sementara sejumlah yang lain menjulur kesana-kemari, atau saling terkait, membelit, berkelindan.

Kali ini, saya mengajak kita semua memandang foto karya Handiwirman—foto yang sama yang ia berikan pada saya dan Agung Jennong—juga sekaligus memandang sejumlah objek dalam presentasi ini, membaca berbagai kutipan dan komentar yang saya rangkum dan ajukan (juga teks yang ditulis Agung Hujatnikajennong) untuk sama-sama masuk dalam suatu dialog yang berpeluang menghadirkan berbagai penafsiran dan pemahaman.

Seluruh sajian kami ini bukanlah ajakan untuk menuju pada satu titik konklusi, tapi untuk terlibat dalam suatu diskusi yang meriah: tentang hubungan benda dan seni, juga peran seniman, terkait dengan segala hal yang remeh-temeh, yang sehari-hari atau bahkan sejarah; yang terlanjur kita yakini sebagai konvensi yang serba final.

Sekali lagi, saya kutip Lefebvre (dan Hegel): The familiar is not necessarily the known.

***Sesudah saya menerangkan bahwa kesenian sebenarnya jiwa yang kelihatan, maka sekarang kita bertanya: “Apakah kesenian umumnya, kesenian yang tidak hanya menceritakan perjuangan hidup manusia, yang juga menceritakan barang yang remeh-temeh berguna bagi manusia?”—S. SuDJOJONO, KESENIAN, SENImAN DAN mASyARAKAT, 1946.

Kehidupan sehari-hari yang nyata justru berisi sedemikian banyak hal yang remeh-temeh. yang besar dan agung, yang penuh perjuangan dan heroik, justru menjauhkan kita dari kenyataan sehari-hari. Persoalannya: seberapa besar perhatian kita pada yang remeh-temeh. “Perjuangan hidup manusia” yang dibayangkan S. Sudjojono begitu banyak terkait dengan soal-soal yang luput dari perhatian kita sehari-hari karena terlanjur hadir dan diperlakukan sebagai yang remeh-temeh.

and comments that I have brought together and presented here (and peruse, too, the text Agung Hujatnikajennong had written), in order for us to enter a dialogue that might provide us with a variety of interpretations and understanding.

The whole presentation today does not constitute a request to go to a certain point of conclusion, but rather to be engaged in a lively discussion: about the relations between art and objects, the role of the artists, with regard to everything that is trivial, mundane, or perhaps even historical; everything that we have come to believe as a final convention.

Let me once again quote Lefebvre (and Hegel): The familiar is not necessarily the known.

***As I have explained that art is actually the soul laid bare, we might now ask: “What is art in general, art that is not only speak of human struggle, but also of mundane things that are of value to humans?” –S. SuDJOJONO, KESENIAN,

SENImAN, DAN mASyARAKAT (THE ART, ARTIST, AND SOCIETy), 1945

The real daily life precisely contains so many mundane things. The great and grandiose, the heroic and the struggling, take us away from daily realities. The issue is: how much attention do we give to the mundane. “The human struggle” that S. Sudjojono had imagined had a lot to do with the issues that escaped our attention because it was present and treated as trivial.

***The New Art movement 1987 is a common effort wishing to situate artistic activities in the map of banal day-to-day living, like the rhythms and manifestations of our lives in general. –GERAKAN SENI RuPA BARu, PROyEK SATu (THE NEW

ART mOvEmENT, FIRST PROJECT, JuNE 1987), PASARAyA DuNIA FANTASI

CATALOGuE, PAGE 2.

Semakin kita perhatikan semua rinci pada foto ini, semakin terseret pula kita ke dalam suasana visual yang enigmatik. Sebentang bantaran sungai adalah pemandangan yang biasa dan sepele. Ajakan Handiwirman untuk memandangnya—bukan sekedar melihat—adalah ajakan untuk mengenali dan bertanya-tanya tentang apa, mengapa, bagaimana berbagai hal rupa, bentuk, bahan bertemu dan berpadu, bertautan di bantaran sungai itu.

Ajakan Handiwirman untuk memandang, mengamati, menelaah bantaran sungai itu, seperti memantulkan gema peringatan Henri Lefebvre yang gemar mengutip pernyataan Hegel: yang akrab tidak selalu berarti sama dengan yang kita ketahui.

Di bawah pandangan yang menyelidik dan benak yang terus-menerus mengajukan berbagai pertanyaan, yang serba biasa dan sepele malah tampil sebagai sederetan cabikan atau serpihan yang makin tercerai-berai, atau bertumpuk-tumpuk. Segalanya hadir makin nyata dapat dikenali. Pada saat bersamaan, ada juga yang terasa aneh dan asing. memandang jeli hal yang sehari-hari, the everyday, adalah mengenal yang akrab dan yang esoterik, yang real dan surreal, secara serentak, bersamaan.

memandang foto di atas, dan kemudian berganti-gantian dengan memandang karya-karya Handiwirman dari proyek Benda ‘In-Situ’, membawa kita masuk dalam situasi cathexis, suasana pertemuan berbagai dorongan dan pengetahuan yang tak sepenuhnya kita sadari dalam jaringan ingatan dan kenangan.

Seperti juga serpihan dan cabikan berbagai benda yang tersangkut di akar-akar pohon bambu dalam foto yang dibuat Handiwirman, demikian pula saya menghimpun catatan-catatan di bawah ini. Berbagai kutipan dan komentar ini adalah hal-hal yang tercabik dan tersangkut dalam benak saya saat berhadapan dengan foto itu, dan kemudian dengan karya-karya Handiwirman (yang selalu ia sebut sebagai Objek). Semuanya tidak serta-merta harus diperlakukan sebagai rangkaian yang padu dan utuh. Beberapa memang

it—is a request to recognize and pose questions about what, why, and how a range of visual stuffs, forms, and materials meet and converge, intermingling at the riverbank.

Handiwirman’s request for us to look at the riverbank, to observe and examine it, seems to be an echo of the warning by Henri Lefebvre, who liked to quote Hegel’s saying: the familiar is not necessarily the known.

under the examining gaze and questioning mind, the mundane and trivial appear as a series of splinters or fragments that are increasingly disjointed or piled up one on top of another. Everything present becomes increasingly obvious and recognizable. At the same time, something feels alien and peculiar. To observe closely the mundane, the everyday, is to get to know the familiar and the esoteric, the real and the surreal, simultaneously, at the same time.

As we look at the picture above, and then consecutively look at Handiwirman’s works in Benda ‘In Situ’ project (literally: In Situ Objects), we are taken into a condition of cathexis, an encounter of various urges and knowledge of which we are not fully conscious, in the network of memories and recollections.

Like the splinters and fragments of a range of objects attached on the bamboo roots in Handiwirman’s pictures, the following notes below are brought together. The various quotes and comments are stuffs that had been torn and become attached to my mind as I faced the picture, and then Handiwirman’s works (which he always calls “Objects”). They do not have to be treated as a whole and integrated series. Some of them are merely tatters or slivers, accidentally hooked or dangling freely; others spread out here and there, or are entangled with one another, interweaving, interlacing.

This time, I ask for all of us to look at the above picture by Handiwirman—the same picture that he had presented to me and Agung Hujatnikajennong—and at the same time view several objects in this presentation; read the various quotes

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With the unassisted Ready-made, art changed it focus from the form of the language to what was being said. Which means that it changed the nature of art from the question of morphology to a question of function. This change—from “appearance” to “conception”—was the beginning of “modern” art and the beginning of “conceptual” art. All art (after Duchamp) is conceptual (in nature) because art only exists conceptually. —JOSEPH KOSuTH (1969), IN DAvID HOPKINS,

RE-THINKING “DuCHAmP EFFECT”, IN AmELIA JONES (ED.), A COmPANION TO

CONTEmPORARy ART SINCE 1945, BLACKWELL PuBLISHING, 2006, P. 152.

***OBJET SURRÉALISTE. An art form that transformed the conception of sculpture, it was associated with the so-called “crise de l’objet” (crisis of the object) in the 1930s. It arose out of the objets trouvés or readymades that Marcel Duchamp exhibited during the heyday of Dada. (…)

In the words of William S. Rubin (in 1968), “The Surrealist object is essentially a three-dimensional collage of ‘found’ articles.” —KEITH ASPLEy, HISTORICAL DICTIONARy OF SuRREALISm,

SCARECROW PRESS, 2010, P. 353-354.

Namun, apakah yang disebut Duchamp sebagai “Readymade” itu seluruhnya terlepas dari intensitas artistiknya sebagai seniman? Bukankah di sana-sini ada tindakan-tindakannya yang mengintervensi kehadiran dan keberadaan benda-benda itu? Pertama-tama, ia mengajukan diri sebagai orang yang bertindak memilih benda tersebut, misalnya urinal, tempat pipis itu. Ia tidak memilih sembarang benda. Hal lain lagi, ia meletakkannya dengan cara yang khusus, tertidur dan bukan lagi berdiri, sehingga dari sudut pandang normal, kita bisa melihat lubang-lubang saluran air tempat pipis itu. Dan kemudian, ia melakukan tindakan penamaan terhadap benda itu dengan memberinya judul dan menandatanganinya. Ia melakukan aksi nominatif terhadap benda yang sebelumnya serba anonim.

(after Duchamp) is conceptual (in nature) because art only exists conceptually. —JOSEPH KOSSuTH (1969), IN DAvID HOPKINS,

RE-THINKING “DuCHAmP EFFECT”, IN AmELIA JONES (ED.), A COmPANION TO

CONTEmPORARy ART SINCE 1945, BLACKWELL PuBLISHING, 2006, P. 152.

***OBJET SuRRÉALISTE. An art form that transformed the conception of sculpture, it was associated with the so-called “crise de l’objet” (crisis of the object) in the 1930s. It arose out of the objets trouvés or ready-mades that marcel Duchamp exhibited during the heyday of Dada. (…)

In the words of William S. Rubin (in 1968), “The Surrealist object is essentially a three-dimensional collage of ‘found’ articles.” —KEITH ASPLEy, HISTORICAL DICTIONARy OF SuRREALISm,

SCARECROW PRESS, 2010, P. 353-354.

Still, can we say that what Duchamp called as the “readymade” had been thoroughly detached from his artistic intensity as an artist? Is it not true that, here and there, his actions had been present, intervening the presence and existence of these objects? First, he presented himself as the person who took the action of selecting the object—the urinal. He did not choose just any other object. Then, he placed it in a specific manner: lying down and no longer standing up; thus in the normal perception we could see the plumbing holes. Next, he took the action of naming the object, giving it a title and giving it his signature. He took nominative actions over an object that had been previously anonymous.

In the later days, Duchamp would expand his ideas about “ready-mades”. He separated them into two groups: “unassisted Ready-mades” and “assisted ready-mades”. The first one required the purity of anonymous objects, without the intervention from the artist; while the second one allowed the artist’s intervention although the main materials are still ready objects, found objects, whether industrial or natural ones.

***Gerakan Seni Rupa Baru 1987 adalah upaya bersama yang hendak meletakkan kegiatan berseni dalam peta kehidupan yang sehari-hari yang amat biasa, seperti irama dan wujud kehidupan kita pada umumnya. —GERAKAN SENI RuPA BARu,

PROyEK SATu, JuNI 1987, KATALOG PASARAyA DuNIA FANTASI, HAL. 2.

***(…) Dan pasar itu adalah tempat bertemunya segala rupa dan jenis barang yang merupakan kebutuhan hidup orang banyak. Pasar sebagai pusat tumpuan kehidupan masyarakat, pusat gerak, pusat kebutuhan, pusat khayal. Pasar sebagai segala-galanya! —GERAKAN SENI RuPA BARu,

PROyEK SATu, JuNI 1987, KATALOG PASARAyA DuNIA FANTASI, HAL. 1.

S. Sudjojono mengajukan kekuatan “jiwa seniman” untuk menghadirkan “perjuangan hidup manusia”, yang nyata, dari kehidupan sehari-hari. Gerakan Seni Rupa Baru 1987 memusatkan perhatian mereka pada pasar dalam konteks masyarakat urban, “pasar sebagai segala-galanya!” Pasar memang tempat yang menghimpun kesibukan dalam kehidupan keseharian kita.

Handiwirman juga sibuk dan suntuk memperhatikan berbagai hal yang sehari-hari hadir, beredar dan lalu-lalang, atau teronggok disekitarnya.

***FOUND OBJECT: A found object is an existing object—often mundane manufactured product—given a new identity as an artwork or part of an artwork. (…) In 1913 Duchamp began to experiment with what he dubbed the Readymade. After adding a title to unaltered, mass-produced object—a urinal or a shovel, for example—he would exhibit it, thereby transforming it into a readymade sculpture. —ROBERT ATKINS, ART SPEAK, A GuIDE TO CONTEmPORARy

IDEAS, mOvEmENTS, BuzzWORDS, ABBEvILLE PRESS, NEW yORK, 1990, P. 81.

***

***(...) And the market is the place where any forms and kinds of objects—the necessities of the public—are brought together. The market as the center of life of the society, the center of movements, center of needs, center of imaginations. The market as everything! – GERAKAN SENI

RuPA BARu, PROyEK SATu, JuNE 1987, CATALOGuE FOR PASARAyA DuNIA

FANTASI, PAGE 1.

S. Sudjojono proposed the idea of the strength of “the artist’s soul” to present the “human struggle”, one that is real, taken from day-to-day living. The New Art movement in 1987 focused their attention to the market in the context of the urban society, “the market as everything!” The market is indeed the place that brings together all activities in our day-to-day living.

Handiwirman has also been busy and engrossed in observing various objects that is present around him, moving near him, or piled up around him.

***FOuND OBJECT: A found object is an existing object—often mundane manufactured product—given a new identity as an artwork or part of an artwork. (…) In 1913 Duchamp began to experiment with what he dubbed the Readymade. After adding a title to unaltered, mass-produced object—a urinal or a shovel, for example—he would exhibit it, thereby transforming it into a readymade sculpture. —ROBERT ATKINS, ART SPEAK, A GuIDE TO CONTEmPORARy

IDEAS, mOvEmENTS, BuzzWORDS, ABBEvILLE PRESS, NEW yORK, 1990, P. 81.

***With the unassisted Ready-made, art changed it focus from of the form of the language to what was being said. Which means that it changed the nature of art from the question of morphology to a question of function. This change—from “appearance” to “conception”—was the beginning of “modern” art and the beginning of “conceptual” art. All art

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final. Apa yang ia lakukan sesungguhnya adalah upaya-upaya spekulatif agar pemikiran dan praktik artistik—untuk dirinya sendiri, paling tidak—bisa terus-menerus diuji dengan sikap skeptis.

***What modern art means is that you have to keep finding new ways to express yourself, to express the problems, that there are no settled ways, no fixed approach. This is a painful situation, and modern art is about this painful situation of having no absolutely definite way of expressing yourself. —LOuISE BOuRGEOIS, 1988, IN DAvID W.

GALENSON, CONCEPTuAL REvOLuTIONS IN TWENTIETH-CENTuRy ART,

CAmBRIDGE uNIvERSITy PRESS, 2009, P. 3.

Sesudah karya “Readymade”nya yang berupa tempat pipis, Fountain (1917), ditolak untuk ikut dalam acara pameran Society of Independent Artists di New york, marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) membawa karya itu ke studio Alfred Stieglitz untuk difoto. Hasil foto ia bawa ke majalah The Blind Man, yang kemudian memuatnya. Di majalah itu, foto Fountain hadir dengan disertai catatan editorial oleh rekan Duchamp, Beatrice Wood, yang mempertanyakan dasar penolakan Society of Independent Artists terhadap karya itu.

***…. Whether Mr. Mutt with his own hands made the fountain or not has no importance. He CHOSE it. He took an ordinary article of life, placed it so that its useful significance disappeared under the new title and point of view—created a new thought for that object. —BEATRICE WOOD/THE BLIND mAN mAGAzINE, IN TONy GODFREy,

CONCEPTuAL ART, PHAIDON, 2006, P. 30.

Duchamp sendiri secara resmi adalah anggota tim seleksi acara pameran Society of Independent Artists. Ia memasukkan karyanya, Fountain (1917), dengan menyaru sebagai R. mutt. Setelah melalui berbagai perdebatan dan argumen, karya itu tetap ditolak oleh Presiden lembaga penyelenggara, William Glickens.

After his readymade urinal object, Fountain (1917), had been rejected from the exhibition of Society of Independent Artists in New york, marcel Duchamp (1887-1968) took the work to Alfred Stieglitz to be photographed. He then brought the resulting picture to The Blind Man magazine, which would subsequently publish it. The magazine presented the picture of Fountain alongside an editorial note by Duchamp’s friend, Beatrice Wood, who questioned the basis for the Society of Independent Artists’ rejection for the work.

***…. Whether mr. mutt with his own hands made the fountain or not has no importance. He CHOSE it. He took an ordinary article of life, placed it so that its useful significance disappeared under the new title and point of view—created a new thought for that object. —BEATRICE

WOOD/THE BLIND mAN mAGAzINE, IN TONy GODFREy, CONCEPTuAL ART,

PHAIDON, 2006, P. 30.

Duchamp was officially a member of the selection team for the exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists. He submitted his work, Fountain (1917), under the name of R. mutt. After long debates and various arguments, the President of the Society, William Glickens, still voted against the work.

Apart from the fact that Duchamp’s work, and the rejection it suffered, have contributed to the emergence of a variety of new streams in the contemporary art practices, Fountain was born and present as a part of Duchamp’s provocative actions against art practices in his time.

If today Handiwirman wishes to try to bring a range of garbage, or banal found objects into an art exhibition space, chances are such an action would be accepted as legitimate. I suppose there is no longer any possibility to do some provocative actions against the various contemporary art practices that the public has so widely accepted today.

Belakangan hari, Duchamp memperluas gagasannya mengenai “Readymade”. Ia mengelompokkannya jadi dua jenis: “unassisted Readymade” dan “assisted Readymade”. yang pertama mensyaratkan kemurnian benda-benda anonim, tanpa campur tangan seniman, sedang yang jenis kedua menghalalkan campur tangan seniman, meskipun bahan-bahan utamanya adalah bahan-bahan jadi, benda-benda temuan, baik hasil industri ataupun dari alam.

Di masa sekarang ini tentunya ada banyak masalah yang bisa kita persoalkan berkaitan dengan gagasan dan karya-karya Duchamp, khususnya terhadap batasan intervensi seniman dalam karya-karya yang ia sebut sebagai “assisted Readymade” tadi (dari yang sederhana seperti Bicycle Wheel, 1913; Ball of Twine, With Hidden Noise, 1916; sampai yang lebih kompleks bahan dan penataannya: Rotary Glass Plate, 1920, Why Not Sneeze Rrose Sélavy, 1921.) Tapi, satu hal yang tampaknya bisa kita sepakati adalah bahwa tindakan dan karyanya telah membuka paradigma baru bagi apa yang kita sebut sebagai “seni” atau bagaimana kita merumuskan “seni” hari ini.

Duchamp, dan kemudian berbagai praktik seni konseptual, telah memungkinkan kita untuk terus menerus mempertanyakan seni, baik secara epistemologis (bagaimana kita tahu bahwa ini sungguh-sungguh karya seni?), maupun ontologis (apa yang menjadikannya karya seni?). Dalam konteks ini Duchamp punya posisi khusus, seperti yang ditegaskan oleh Joseph Kosuth (dalam salah satu kutipan di atas).

Sampai hari ini, bahkan Handiwirman pun tidak bisa menghindarkan diri dari dorongan untuk terus mempertanyakan praktik artistiknya sendiri, secara epistemologis maupun ontologis.

Jika kita bisa menerima bahwa karya-karya Handiwirman dalam proyek “Benda in-situ” adalah upaya investigasinya atas persoalan-persoalan epistemologis dan ontologis praktik kesenian kontemporer, maka kita bisa membayangkan bahwa ia tidak sedang berharap untuk mendapatkan jawaban

In the contemporary era, there’s bound to be many issues that we can discuss in relation to Duchamp’s ideas and works, especially in relation to the limits to the artist’s intervention in the works that he called “assisted Ready-mades” (from the simple ones such as Bicycle Wheel, 1913; Ball of Twine, With Hidden Noise, 1916; to the more complex ones in terms of the materials and arrangement: Rotary Glass Plate, 1920; Why Not Sneeze Rrose Sélavy, 1921). We can, however, agree on one thing: his actions and works have opened a new paradigm for what we call “art” or how we today define “art”.

Duchamp, and then a range of conceptual art practices, have enabled us to keep on questioning art, epistemologically (how do we know that this is truly art?) as well as ontologically (what makes it art?). In this context, Duchamp had a special position, as affirmed by Joseph Kosuth (in one of the quotes above).

To this day, even Handiwirman is not able to escape from the urge to keep on questioning his own artistic practices, epistemologically as well as ontologically.

If we accept that Handiwirman’s works in the Benda In Situ project constitute his efforts of investigation regarding the epistemological and ontological issues of the contemporary art practices, we can imagine that he is not wishing to receive a final answer. What he has done actually constitutes his speculative efforts so that his artistic practices and ideas—at least for himself—can be skeptically examined.

***What modern art means is that you have to keep finding new ways to express yourself, to express the problems, that there are no settled ways, no fixed approach. This is a painful situation, and modern art is about this painful situation of having no absolutely definite way of expressing yourself. —LOuISE BOuRGEOIS, 1988, IN DAvID W.

GALENSON, CONCEPTuAL REvOLuTIONS IN TWENTIETH-CENTuRy ART,

CAmBRIDGE uNIvERSITy PRESS, 2009, P. 3.

18 19

proyek seni rupa-nya yang diberi judul Cigondewah: An Art Project. Barang-barang itu akan mengisi ruang pameran di NuS museum, Singapura dari 18 Februari - 24 April 2011.

Laporan atau berita di koran Kompas dan pameran Tisna Sanjaya mempersoalkan masalah yang serupa (sampah, lingkungan hidup) dengan alat dan cara yang berbeda. yang pertama memanfaatkan suatu investigasi dan pelaporan jurnalistik melalui media massa, yang kedua melibatkan partisipasi publik dan intensi artistik seorang seniman. Sebagai suatu tindakan sosial-politik, jika berhasil, kedua-duanya bisa bermuara pada wilayah yang sama: kesadaran pengelolaan sampah dalam kehidupan publik.

Handiwirman tidak berminat memandang dan mempersoalkan sampah sebagai suatu persoalan sosial. Ia hanya berminat pada kemungkinan untuk mengajukan sampah sebagai titik awal untuk mempersoalkan aspek-aspek formal yang memungkinkan kita mengajukan kembali sejumlah soal yang berkaitan dengan praktik artistik seni rupa masa kini, tanpa harus mengulang apa yang telah dibongkar (dan dibangun) oleh marcel Duchamp.

Tapi, tidak berarti kita tidak bisa mempersoalkan (kembali) Duchamp, bukan?

***Duchamp exalts the gesture without ever falling, like so many modern artists, into gesticulation. In some cases the Readymades are pure, that is, they pass without modification from the state of being an everyday object to that of being a “work of anti-art”; on other occasions they are altered or rectified, generally in an ironic manner tending to prevent any confusion between them and artistic objects. —OCTAvIO PAz, mARCEL DuCHAmP, APPEARANCE

STRIPPED BARE, ARCADE PuBLISHING, NEW yORK, 1978, P. 16.

Pilihan marcel Duchamp atas berbagai benda jadi, Readymade, adalah karena ia bisa menampilkan bentuk yang serba ”murni”,

to re-examine some issues in relation to the artistic practices of the contemporary art today, without having to repeat what marcel Duchamp had deconstructed (and constructed).

Still, that does not mean we cannot (re)examine Duchamp, does it?

***Duchamp exalts the gesture without ever falling, like so many modern artists, into gesticulation. In some cases the Ready-mades are pure, that is, they pass without modification from the state of being an everyday object to that of being a “work of anti-art”; on other occasions they are altered or rectified, generally in an ironic manner tending to prevent any confusion between them and artistic objects. —OCTAvIO PAz, mARCEL DuCHAmP, APPEARANCE STRIPPED

BARE, ARCADE PuBLISHING, NEW yORK, 1978, P. 16.

marcel Duchamp’s choice for a range of ready-mades was based on the fact that he was able to present “pure” forms, the results of machine productions, free from artistic intention or aesthetic quality, or even from the taste about what is good and what is ugly. Now we can speculate or be skeptical about it: the things he had selected, and the way he treated and arranged them (in what he called “assisted ready-mades”), were the things that, to a certain extent, we could consider as acts that had damaged the purity of the ready-mades.

Some have also declared Duchamp’s acts as “avant-garde opportunism”.

***I actually discovered the shapes (of my works) around me, every day. I found them through my interest in observing a variety of minute things around me. There are rarely big objects. Often only the small and mundane things. —HANDIWIRmAN SAPuTRA, INTERvIEW WITH ENIN SuPRIyANTO,

AuGuST 2009.

Lepas dari kenyataan bahwa karya Duchamp dan peristiwa penolakannya telah menyumbang berbagai arus baru dalam praktik seni rupa kontemporer, Fountain memang lahir dan hadir sebagai bagian dari tindakan provokatif Duchamp atas praktik seni rupa di masanya.

Jika hari ini Handiwirman ingin coba-coba membawa berbagai jenis sampah, atau benda-benda temuan remeh-temeh ke ruang pameran seni rupa, besar kemungkinan hal itu akan diterima sebagai sesuatu yang sah. Rasanya, tidak ada lagi kemungkinan untuk melakukan provokasi terhadap berbagai bentuk praktik seni rupa kontemporer yang sedemikian luas diterima umum di masa sekarang ini.

Jadi, bagaimana seorang seniman, melalui karya-karyanya, masih bisa mengajukan suatu proposal reflektif yang hendak menguji kembali berbagai aspek dalam praktik seni rupa yang telah mapan dan diterima sebagai kewajaran di masa sekarang?

Handiwirman memilih cara persuasi dan penuh spekulasi. Karya-karyanya dalam Benda In-situ, seperti juga karya-karya lain dengan karakteristik konseptual yang jelas, adalah wujud dari keinginan untuk melakukan refleksi pemikiran terhadap alasan-alasan keberadaannya sendiri.

******

Cara pandang sebagian besar warga Jakarta dalam menangani sampah ternyata belum berubah, masih sebatas membuang. Rumah tangga sebagai penghasil sampah terbesar belum melakukan upaya daur ulang dengan reduce, reuse, recycle. —PENANGANAN SAmPAH: SAmPAH, mEmANG

SAmPAH, KOmPAS, SENIN, 7 mARET 2011, HAL. 27.

***Pada minggu yang sama dengan berita harian KOmPAS di atas, perupa Tisna Sanjaya membawa sejumlah barang, banyak diantaranya adalah sampah, sebagai bagian dari presentasi

So, how does and artist, through his works, propose any reflective proposal to re-examine the variety of aspects in art practices that have been established and accepted as the norm today?

Handiwirman took the way of persuasion, full of speculations. The works in Benda In Situ, like other works with clear conceptual characteristics, are the manifestations of his wish to prompt reflections upon the reasons of his own art practices.

***most Jakarta citizens still have the same view about how they manage their waste; they merely dispose them. Households, the biggest producer of waste, have not conducted any efforts of reduction, reuse, and recycling. –PENANGANAN SAmPAH: SAmPAH, mEmANG SAmPAH (THE mANAGEmENT

OF WASTE: WASTE, AND WASTE INDEED), KOmPAS DAILy, mONDAy mARCH

7, 2011, P. 27

In the same week as when the news above appeared in the Kompas daily, the artist Tisna Sanjaya brought a number of objects, many of them are waste products, as a part of the presentation of his art project entitled Cigondewah: An Art Project. The things will fill the exhibition room at NuS museum, Singapore, from February 18 to April 24, 2011.

The report or news in the Kompas daily and Tisna Sanjaya’s exhibition speak of the same thing (waste, environment) using different methods and tools. The first one makes use of some sort of investigations and journalistic report through the mass media; the second involves public participations and the artistic intent of an artist. As socio-political actions, if they are successful, can lead to the same area: the awareness regarding waste management in public life.

Handiwirman does not wish to perceive and speak of waste as some social problem. He is only interested in the possibility of using waste as the point of origin from which we might depart in order to discuss about the formal aspects that enable us

/ i actually discovered the shapes (of my works) around me, every day. i found them through my interest in observing a variety of minute things around me. there are rarely big objects. often only the small and mundane things. —handiwirman saputra, interview with enin supriyanto, august 2009.

22 23

karya trimatra maupun lukisan-lukisannya, Handiwirman memulai dengan membuat dulu berbagai bentuk dan benda dari berbagai bahan remeh temeh yang ada di sekitarnya.

Dengan kata lain, Handiwirman tidak percaya pada kemurnian bentuk dan benda Readymade yang diajukan Duchamp. Bagi Handiwirman, tindakan memilih pun, sudah merupakan perwujudan niat, selera, pengetahuan si seniman.

Kenyataan bahwa benda-benda yang dipilih Duchamp adalah benda yang mempunyai bentuk-bentuk dan bahan yang khas—meskipun memang hasil produksi pabrik—tidak serta merta menggagalkan kenyataan bahwa benda-benda itu sudah memiliki tanda-tanda kualitas artistik tertentu. Keinginan Duchamp untuk menghadirkan benda dan bentuk yang serba netral, tanpa noda “seni”, sesungguhnya tidak pernah benar-benar berhasil; bahkan intervensinya sebagai seniman tidak pernah bisa sepenuhnya bersifat ‘masa bodoh’, berjarak, indifference.

Jadi, jika kita berusaha mencari benda atau bahan di sekitar kita, dari kehidupan sehari-hari, yang masih mungkin terbebas dari kualitas semacam itu maka pilihan yang tersedia adalah: sampah, barang bekas yang terkoyak, berupa sisa-sisa, serpihan, cabikan. Benda-benda semacam ini bahkan sudah terbebas dari apapun ikatan formal-fungsional yang pernah melekat padanya saat ia dirancang dan diproduksi dalam pabrik.

Pada berbagai benda sisa dan bekas, dari serakan berbagai bahan yang tersia-sia inilah Handiwirman berusaha menemukan berbagai kemungkinan untuk menyusun suatu logika artistik yang khas, yang sepenuhnya bergantung pada formulasi konseptualnya sendiri. Dalam bentuknya yang paling umum tidak ada kualitas artistik atau kode estetik apapun yang melekat pada sampah, barang bekas dan sisa-sisa. Pada benda-benda ini kondisi “tak ber-seni”—atau “an-artistic”, dalam istilah Octavio Paz: kondisi bukan seni, tidak juga anti-seni, tapi di antara keduanya—nyaris bersifat total. Ruang jeda, void, inilah yang kemudian hendak diisi

available are: garbage, broken used objects, remainders, splinters, rags. Such objects have even been liberated from any of their formal-functional binds that had once been attached to them when they were being designed and produced in the factories.

In various used and leftover objects, from various castoffs, Handiwirman tries to find a range of possibilities to design a certain characteristic artistic logic, one that is fully depend on his own conceptual formulations. In their most common forms, there are no artistic or aesthetic codes that are still attached to waste, used objects, castoffs. With these things we find the condition of being “an-artistic”— in the words of Octavio Paz, the condition of not art, but not anti-art either; rather, it is the condition in between—that is almost total in nature. It is such a void that Handiwirman then wishes to fill through the presence and appearance of his objects.

Handiwirman’s works actually constitute the effort to re-present the “artistic mode” of a range of materials, forms, visual qualities, and their various links that he finds in different used and leftover objects. The paradox, or even the irony, that he faces here is that he can only present all of them within the scope of the existing artistic practice: painting, shaping, arranging, assembling—things that require craftsmanship in a certain mimetic project: presenting the reality of the existence of “the aesthetic of waste, of used and leftover objects” in a new configuration, a collage of various materials and visuals.

Such an attitude precisely puts him in another paradoxical realm (meta-paradox?), or even a tautological circle: different formal and visual elements in his works are present to continuously affirm the presence and existence of their point of reference: waste and castoffs. Still, it is precisely this condition that Handiwirman wishes to target.

To confirm the presence of his objects—as “waste”, “used and leftover objects”—Handiwirman had the chance to make several pictures showing these objects piled up, piled up at

hasil proses produksi mesin, yang terbebas dari intensitas artistik atau kualitas estetik, atau bahkan dari selera tentang yang baik dan buruk. Kini, kita bisa berspekulasi, bersikap skeptis: bahwa benda-benda yang dipilihnya, dan cara ia memperlakukan dan menatanya (dalam apa yang ia sebut sebagai “assisted readymade”) adalah hal-hal, yang sampai batas tertentu, bisa kita nyatakan sebagai tindakan yang telah menodai kemurnian benda Readymade itu.

Ada juga yang menuduh tindakannya itu sebagai “oportunisme (kaum) garda depan” (avant garde opportunism).

***Aku sebenarnya menemukan bentuk-bentuk (karyaku) itu di sekitarku, sehari-hari. Aku temukan lewat keasyikanku sendiri mengamati berbagai benda kecil di sekitarku. Jarang benda yang besar. Seringkali benda yang kecil dan sepele. —HANDIWIRmAN SAPuTRA, WAWANCARA DENGAN ENIN

SuPRIyANTO, AGuSTuS 2009.

***In Surrealism the everyday is not the familiar and banal realm that it seems to be; only our drab habits of mind understand it in this way. Instead the everyday is where the marvellous exists. —BEN HIGHmORE, EvERyDAy LIFE AND CuLTuRAL

THEORy: AN INTRODuCTION, ROuTLEDGE, LONDON, 2002, P. 46.

***Surrealism is about an effort, an energy, to find the marvellous in the everyday, to recognize the everyday as a dynamic montage of elements, to make it strange so that its strangeness can be recognized. —BEN HIGHmORE, EvERyDAy

LIFE AND CuLTuRAL THEORy: AN INTRODuCTION, ROuTLEDGE, LONDON,

2002, P. 47.

Inilah celah yang ingin dimasuki oleh Handiwirman.

Kali ini ia memilih sampah, atau bahkan serpihan dan cabikan benda-benda bekas, sisa. Di masa sebelumnya, baik untuk

***In Surrealism the everyday is not the familiar and banal realm that it seems to be; only our drab habits of mind understand it in this way. Instead the everyday is where the marvelous exists. —BEN HIGHmORE, EvERyDAy LIFE AND CuLTuRAL

THEORy: AN INTRODuCTION, ROuTLEDGE, LONDON, 2002, P. 46.

***Surrealism is about an effort, energy, to find the marvelous in the everyday, to recognize the everyday as a dynamic montage of elements, to make it strange so that its strangeness can be recognized. —BEN HIGHmORE, EvERyDAy

LIFE AND CuLTuRAL THEORy: AN INTRODuCTION, ROuTLEDGE, LONDON,

2002, P. 47.

This is the niche that Handiwirman wishes to exploit.

Today, he chooses waste, or even splinters and rags of used objects, of remainders. In the previous period, for his three-dimensional works as well as his paintings, Handiwirman began by creating various shapes and objects from a range of mundane materials around him.

In other words, Handiwirman does not believe in the purity of forms and ready-mades that Duchamp had proposed. To Handiwirman, even the act of choosing is already the manifestation of the artist’s intent, taste, and knowledge.

The fact that the objects that Duchamp had selected were objects that had specific forms and materials—although they were indeed factory-made—did not necessarily cancel out the fact that the objects had already certain artistic qualities. Duchamp’s desire to present all-neutral objects and forms, without any “art blemish”, was never truly fulfilled; even his intervention as an artist could never be distanced, indifferent.

So, if we try to find regular objects or materials around us that might still be free from such qualities, the only option

24 25

wujud aneh, dalam suatu teater absurditas. Pada saat yang bersamaan, berbagai objek itu justeru ingin hadir menjadi dirinya sendiri.

***

Bahkan Octavia Paz, dalam ulasannya yang bernas dan lancar, erudite, mengenai marcel Duchamp, sempat juga menyinggung soal objek dan sampah ini:

***Objects are not born: we make them, they have no sex; nor do they die: they wear out or become useless. Their tomb is the trash can or the recycling furnace. —OCTAvIO PAz,

mARCEL DuCHAmP, APPEARANCE STRIPPED BARE, ARCADE PuBLISHING,

Ny, 1978, P. 27.

Handiwirman menemukan objek-objeknya yang “ideal” di kantong-kantong sampah, di berbagai barang dan kotoran yang tersangkut di akar pohon di bantaran sungai, di mana-mana, di sekitarnya, benda-benda sisa, bekas ini dan itu, yang tersia-sia; benda-benda yang tampil “murni”: tak berfungsi, tak ber-seni. Atau, dalam ungkapan Handiwirman: Tak berakar, tak berpucuk.

oleh Handiwirman melalui kehadiran dan penampilan objek-objeknya.

Karya-karya Handiwirman sesungguhnya upaya penghadiran kembali “moda artistik” berbagai bahan, bentuk, kualitas visual serta berbagai kemungkinan pertautannya, yang ia temukan pada berbagai benda sisa dan bekas. Paradoks, atau bahkan ironi yang segera ia hadapi adalah bahwa ia hanya bisa menampilkan semua itu dalam lingkup praktik artistik yang telah tersedia: melukis, membentuk, menata, merakit—hal-hal yang mensyaratkan keterampilan kerja, craftmanship, dalam suatu proyek mimetik: sebisa mungkin menghadirkan kenyataan adanya “estetika sampah, barang bekas dan sisa” dalam suatu konfigurasi baru, kolase dari berbagai unsur bahan dan rupa.

Sikap ini justeru memasukkannya dalam lingkup paradoks yang lain (meta-paradoks?), atau bahkan lingkaran tautologis: berbagai unsur bentuk dan rupa dalam karyanya justeru hadir untuk terus menerus menyatakan kehadiran dan keberadaan sumber rujukannya: sampah dan barang-barang sisa. Tapi, justeru kondisi inilah yang memang hendak dituju oleh Handiwirman.

untuk menegaskan kehadiran objek-objeknya—sebagai “sampah”, “benda-benda sisa dan bekas”—Handiwirman sempat membuat sejumlah foto yang menghadirkan mereka sedang teronggok, tergeletak di berbagai tempat (sungai, tepi jalan, tempat pembuangan sampah, lapangan rumput, daerah persawahan, dan lain-lain). Rekaman fotografi, seperti umum kita ketahui adalah medium yang sangat keras-kepala meyakinkan kita akan “kebenaran” apa-apa yang direkamnya. Dengan itu pula setiap lembar foto menghadirkan dirinya sebagai indeks dari suatu kenyataan: di suatu tempat, di suatu waktu (yang lalu).

Keberadaan objek-objek karya Handiwirman dalam foto-foto itu juga menyuarakan pernyataan: di suatu waktu, di suatu tempat, aku adalah benda sisa, bekas barang yang teronggok dan tergeletak sembarangan, terkait satu sama lain, menjadi

different sites (river, by the road, the dumpster, a field of grass, rice fields, etc). Photographic records, as we are all aware of, are the medium that would be so obstinate in trying to convince us about the “truth” of what they have recorded. Every piece of picture thus presents itself as an index of a reality: at a certain time, in a certain time (in the past).

The presence of Handiwirman’s objects in these pictures also convey the statement: sometime, somewhere, I was a used object, a castoff, piled up and lay at a random place, inter-related, becoming a strange form, in a theater of absurdity. At the same time, the various objects precisely wish to be present as themselves.

Even Octavio Paz, in his erudite review about marcel Duchamp, had also spoken of the issue of objects and waste:

*** Objects are not born: we make them, they have no sex; nor do they die: they wear out or become useless. Their tomb is the trash can or the recycling furnace. —OCTAvIO PAz,

mARCEL DuCHAmP, APPEARANCE STRIPPED BARE, ARCADE PuBLISHING,

Ny, 1978, P. 27.

Handiwirman finds his “ideal” objects in disposal bins, in various objects and waste attached to the roots by the riverbank, everywhere, around it, the leftover things, used things, and the castoffs; the objects that appear “pure”: had no function, no art. Or, in Handiwirman’s words: Having no roots, no shoots.

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1/ PROSEDuR KuRATORIAL

Bagi seorang kurator terdapat beberapa prosedur dan pendekatan yang bisa ditempuh dalam penyajian sebuah pameran. Salah satu yang utama dalam prosedur itu adalah pembacaan karya-karya. Galibnya, dalam membaca, kurator segera berhadap-hadapan langsung dengan karya-karya seniman. Di situ, kurator seringkali memosisikan sebagai mediator, selaku penafsir yang ‘superior’, yang berusaha untuk memahami maksud seniman dengan cara menampilkan kekuatan-kekuatan pengungkapan visual yang tersirat. melalui berbagai analisa, karya-karya seni dimaknai, dihubungkan dengan ranah teoretik tertentu atau konsep-konsep kunci, misalnya dalam filsafat, sosiologi dan sejarah seni rupa.

Oleh karena berorientasi pada objek / artefak, dalam banyak kasus, kerja kuratorial kebanyakan sangat bergantung pada ‘produk jadi’. Setiap karya seni dilihat sebagai tindakan penciptaan makna yang merupakan manifestasi paling sahih dari ‘jati diri’ sang seniman. Secara historis, hal ini

1/ CuRATORIAL PROCEDuRE

There have been several procedures and approaches that a curator can take to present an exhibition. One of the main procedures is the reading of the works. Normally, as the curator reads the artwork, he or she stands directly facing the works that the artist has made. Here the curator often takes the position as a mediator, a “superior” interpreter who tries to understand the artist’s intent by putting forth the implicit power of the visual displays. By employing different analyses, the works of art are understood, given meaning, related with certain theoretical realms or key concepts, for example in philosophy, sociology, and art history.

Owing to its orientation to objects/artifacts, in many cases the curatorial work depends on the “end product”. Every work of art is seen as an act of signification, an effort to create meaning, which is the most legitimate manifestation of an artist’s “identity”. Historically, this has to do with the

melampaui naturalisasi: yang akrab dan yang asing / beyond naturalization: the familiar and the foreign —agung hujatnikajennong

28

Pada awalnya, saya menganggap tawaran itu sebagai suatu ajakan untuk berspekulasi. Namun bukan tanpa alasan, bagi Handiwirman foto ini ternyata sangat istimewa. menurutnya, ia adalah ‘artefak’ penting yang bisa mewakili gagasan mendasar dalam karya-karya instalasi yang ia siapkan untuk pameran ini. Penting untuk digarisbawahi bahwa Handiwirman tidak memberikan informasi tambahan apapun dalam bentuk tulisan / caption yang menyertainya. Sebaliknya, ia justru menganggap bahwa tulisan kuratorial kami dan karya-karya instalasinyalah yang kelak akan menjadi caption untuk foto itu.

Initially, I consider the offer as an invitation for speculation. However, it is not without reasons that to Handiwirman the picture is very special. He thinks that the picture is an important “artifact” that can represent the fundamental idea in the works of installation that he has prepared for this exhibition. It is important to underline that Handiwirman does not give any additional information in the form of some text or caption accompanying the picture. Rather, he thinks that our curatorial texts, along with his works of installation, would later serve as the caption for the picture...

berhubungan dengan kerja seorang kurator sebagai seorang bagian dari institusi museum yang bertanggungjawab terhadap presentasi objek-objek dalam ruang pamer. melalui metode yang fenomenologis itu seorang kurator menggali dan membubuhkan makna pada objek-objek visual dengan bukti-bukti yang kasatmata, misalnya kualitas bentuk, permukaan, simbol atau tanda-tanda lainnya. Kurator juga pada umumnya menghubungkan karya-karya dengan, atau menggolongkannya ke dalam kategori-kategori tertentu untuk tujuan pemetaan dalam sejarah.

melalui perbandingan dengan ‘metode’ kuratorial di atas, maka saya ingin menggarisbawahi bagaimana pameran tunggal Handiwirman Saputra ini menempuh prosedur atau cara-cara yang berbeda dalam hal perumusan dan penyajiannya. Secara pribadi, saya bahkan menganggap pameran ini sebagai suatu eksperimentasi kuratorial tersendiri.

Dalam proses persiapannya, pameran ini mengalami penundaan, perubahan dan proses ‘tambal-sulam’ yang menarik. Pada awalnya, kami—saya dan Enin Supriyanto—selaku kurator merancang pameran ini dengan format dan metode yang konvensional, yakni sebagai suatu presentasi karya-karya mutakhir Handiwirman di dalam ruang pamer. Proses pengerjaan karya-karya Handiwirman telah memakan waktu lebih dari satu tahun, dan selama itu pula kami terlibat dalam dialog segitiga yang kontinyu untuk merumuskan tajuk dan kerangka pameran.

Akan tetapi, hanya tiga bulan sebelum pembukaan pameran, secara mengejutkan Handiwirman menawarkan kepada kami gagasan yang baru. Justru ketika karya-karya instalasinya telah selesai dikerjakan, dan proses penulisan sudah dimulai, ia meminta kami untuk berpikir ulang tentang prosedur kuratorial yang sebelumnya ingin kami tempuh. Ketimbang meminta kami untuk menyelesaikan tulisan tentang karya-karya instalasi terbarunya, dia malah meminta kami untuk mengulas sebuah foto. Namun menariknya, foto itu justru bukan merupakan salah satu karya yang ia ingin presentasikan di dalam ruang pamer.

1/ I.J. Gleb, A Study of Writing, dikutip oleh Tia Setiadi, dalam Benda-benda, Bahasa dan Kala: Mencari Simetri Tersembunyi dalam Teman-temanku dari Atap Bahasa karya Afrizal Malna, lihat Zen Hae (ed.), Dari Zaman Citra ke Metafiksi, Bunga Rampai Telaah Sastra DKJ, Jakarta: Kepustakaan Populer Gramedia, 2010, hal. 131. 2/ Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida, Richard Howard (trans.), New York: Hill and Wang, 1981, hal. 7

1/ I.J. Gleb, A Study of Writing, quoted by Tia Setiadi, in Benda-benda, Bahasa dan Kala: Mencari Simetri Tersembunyi dalam Teman-temanku dari Atap Bahasa karya Afrizal Malna, see Zen Hae (ed.), Dari Zaman Citra ke Metafiksi, Bunga Rampai Telaah Sastra DKJ, Jakarta: Kepustakaan Populer Gramedia, 2010, p. 131. 2/ Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida, Richard Howard (trans.), New York: Hill and Wang, 1981, p. 7

curator’s work as a part of the museum institution that is responsible for the presentations of objects in the exhibition space. By employing the phenomenological method, a curator explores and gives meaning to the visual objects, using visible evidence such as the quality of the forms, surfaces, symbols, or other kinds of signs. The curator also often relates works with certain categories, or puts them into such categories, in order to determine their position vis-a-vis the map of history.

using the comparison with the above-mentioned curatorial “method”, I would like to give an emphasis how Handiwirman Saputra’s solo exhibition has undergone different procedures or manners in terms of its formulation and presentation. Personally, I even think that this exhibition constitutes a distinct curatorial experiment.

During the preparation, the exhibition has seen delays, changes, and an intriguing process of ‘changing and mending”. In the beginning, we—Enin Supriyanto and I—as curators designed the exhibition using the conventional method and format; i.e. as a presentation of Handiwirman’s latest works in an exhibition space. The process in which the works were made had taken more than a year, and throughout the process we have been involved in a continuous, triangular process of dialogues to prepare and determine the title and framework of the exhibition.

Only three months before the opening of the show, however, Handiwirman surprisingly came up to us with a new idea. Precisely after his works of installation have all been finished and the writing for the curatorial texts has proceeded, Handiwirman asked us to re-think the curatorial procedure that we have previously selected. Rather than asking us to finish the writing of curatorial text about his latest works of installation, he asked us to review a piece of photograph. Intriguingly, the picture is not among the works he wishes to present in the exhibition space.

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lukisan-lukisan di dinding dalam rotunda yang melengkung. Sementara dalam tradisi Timur, kita juga bisa menemukan format ini dalam gambar-gambar dinding candi, lukisan gulung (scroll painting), bahkan artefak wayang beber, yang umumnya digunakan untuk memaparkan suatu sekuens, atau urutan suatu kisahan /narasi.

Foto Handiwirman nampaknya tidak sedang mengemukakan urutan narasi tertentu. Kita bisa ‘membacanya’ dari kiri ke kanan, atau sebaliknya. Selain karena objek-objek yang mewakili pemandangan tepi kali, format panoramik di situ cenderung merujuk menekankan aspek lansekap, di mana keluasan ditampilkan sedemikian rupa. Objek yang mendominasi pandangan kita adalah sebagian wajah dari batang Sungai Kontheng. Air yang tenang menyiratkan kontur dasar sungai yang cenderung datar. melihat foto ini secara sekilas, kita tak bisa dengan segera menyimpulkan arah arus yang mengalirkan air. Ia seperti menyembunyikan posisi hulu dan hilir, sampai kita temukan gambaran dataran yang sedikit lebih tinggi di kolong jembatan. Di situ, seorang laki-laki tengah duduk dan memandang ke arah kita dari jauh.

Secara menyeluruh, foto ini adalah fragmen ruang dari arsitektur alam yang diambil pada suatu momen tertentu. Kita tahu, alam adalah entitas yang hidup dan terus berubah dalam lintasan waktu. Namun dalam foto ini, aspek waktu hadir secara samar-samar. yang pertama adalah penanda masa yang dihadirkan melalui jembatan dan jalan, yang mengarahkan kita pada kesimpulan bahwa foto ini diambil pada jaman ketika manusia sudah menggunakan mobil sebagai moda transportasi. Kedua, cahaya matahari yang jatuh pada permukaan air dan tanah memang bisa memberi petunjuk kapan foto ini diambil. Akan tetapi kita tidak bisa memastikan apakah foto ini diambil pagi, siang atau sore hari, kecuali jika kita mau memetakan arah bayangan rumpun bambu, posisi hulu dan hilir Sungai Kontheng dalam koordinat mata angin. Keempat, elemen lain yang menunjukkan waktu adalah batu-batu berlumut di tepian sungai. Kita tahu sungai selalu mengalami pasang surut secara alamiah. Dan rupanya sungai itu tengah surut. Batu-batu itu tak mungkin berlumut

Handiwirman’s picture does not seem to present any distinct narrative sequence. We can “read” it from left to right or the other way round. Apart from the objects that represent a riverbank view, the panoramic format of the picture tends to give an emphasis on the aspect of the landscape, in which expansiveness is presented in such a way. The objects that dominate our sight are a part of Kontheng River. The calm water implies that the riverbed tends to be flat. As we briefly look at the picture, we cannot immediately conclude the direction in which the water goes. The upstream and downstream seem to be hidden, until we discover the sight of a higher ground under the bridge. A man is sitting there, looking at the spectator from afar.

As a whole, the picture constitutes a spatial fragment from the natural architecture taken at a certain moment in time. We are aware that the nature is a living entity that keeps on changing with time. In the picture, however, the temporal aspect is present only vaguely. The first set of signs of time are presented through the bridge and the road, which bring us to the conclusion that the picture was taken at a time when humans already use cars as a mode of transportation. The second sign is the reflections of sunlight on the water surface and land, which might indicate the time in which the picture was taken. We could not, however, be certain whether the picture was taken in the morning, during the day, or in the evening, except if we map the direction of the shadows of the bamboo groove and the upstream and the downstream using the compass points. Another set of elements that indicate the time is the moss-covered rocks at the riverbank. We are aware that the water would naturally recede and flow. It seems that the water was receding when the picture was taken. The rocks would not be covered in moss and forms such irregular lumps had they not been covered under the water and eroded by the river flow.

The panoramic composition of the picture triggers my imagination about a proscenium, with us, the spectators, watching the objects as horizontally-arranged actors in a scene. On the stage, we observe how the picture does not

3/ Dalam tulisan ini, saya banyak memanfaatkan cara-cara analisa foto yang dianjurkan Roland Barthes dalam bukunya Camera Lucida, sebagian besar melalui paparan dan elaborasi St. Sunardi, dalam bukunya, Semiotika Negativa, Yogyakarta: Penerbit Kanal, 2002.

3/ In this text, I often make use of the methods of analyzing pictures as proposed by Roland Barthes in his book, Camera Lucida, mostly explained and elaborated by St. Sunardi in Semiotika Negativa, Yogyakarta: Penerbit Kanal, 2002.

... We welcomed the idea not only as a way to escape from monotony, but also as a challenge to rethink about the procedures that we usually adopt in presenting an art exhibition. In this show, the curators eventually did not only face the works of art as the final products of a creative process. Rather, Enin and I were forced to perform different acts of reposition and retroaction. Our reading can go retroactively, or going back and forth in inductive as well as deductive manners as we took the position as interpreters, and stepped into a more open field. One can even say that at a certain point, the three of us—Enin, Handiwirman, and I—take the same position of a spectator who reads and freely responds to the information presented to us in the picture.

Pada tataran paradigmatik, kita boleh membandingkan foto Handiwirman ini dengan suatu format dalam fotografi yang disebut panorama (dari bahasa yunani, ‘pan’, all dan ‘horama’, view). Dimensi foto yang memanjang secara horisontal menegaskan hal itu. Secara historis, gaya ini berakar dari tradisi penggambaran dalam seni lukis. Kelahiran gaya ini juga didorong oleh keinginan untuk menyalin apa yang tertangkap sejauh-jauhnya oleh jangkauan pandangan mata manusia, sebisa-bisanya secara rinci dan horisontal, nyaris 180 derajat. Dianggap efektif untuk menyajikan impresi tentang keluasan suatu lansekap atau momen bersejarah, dalam tradisi piktorial Barat format ini adalah pengembangan dari

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gambaran karya-karya instalasi Handiwirman sebelumnya juga sudah terlanjur melekat kuat dalam ingatan saya. maka, sebelum kembali ke foto, saya ingin menengok tabiat artistik Handiwirman yang selama ini saya kenal.

Dalam karya-karya instalasi Handiwirman selama ini, karakter-karakter material yang remeh-temeh (rambut manusia, busa, kapas, plastik, benang, serpihan kertas, puntung rokok, dll.) dihadirkan kembali, tidak sepenuhnya secara baru, tapi juga tidak secara apa adanya. Selama ini, dalam karya-karya Handiwirman juga tersirat suatu intensi untuk menggabungkan, mencampur, dan menyatukan satu, dua atau lebih material yang berkarakter visual berbeda, misalnya antara yang lembek dan yang tajam, yang ringkih dan yang kokoh, dan lain sebagainya. Hal ini terbaca ketika mencermati, misalnya, karya-karyanya yang menampilkan helai-helai rambut manusia yang dirakit-rakit menjadi satu dengan lipatan-lipatan kecil sampah plastik. Atau ketika ia mengikat dan menjahit sobekan-sobekan busa ringan yang dibentuk menjadi benda tiga dimensional berkesan pejal. memandangi karya-karyanya, persepsi mental kita tentang karakter material dan benda-benda yang serba remeh itu juga seringkali ‘dipermainkan’. Terutama pada karya-karya trimatranya, kita seringkali menemukan kejutan dan pertanyaan oleh karena wujudnya yang seringkali ‘ganjil’.

Karya-karya Handiwirman juga dilatarbelakangi oleh caranya yang unik dalam melihat hubungan antar benda, dan hubungan antara benda dan manusia (secara personal maupun sosial). Selain itu ia juga gemar mengamati bagaimana benda-benda dapat menimbulkan refleksi mental pada manusia. untuk beberapa material seperti rambut manusia, karet gelang, karet silikon dan kertas Handiwirman bahkan punya ikatan personal dan emosional yang unik. Kegemarannya mengamati dan mengumpulkan benda-benda remeh-temeh, yang bagi orang lain adalah sampah, sudah dimulai semenjak ia kecil. Latar belakang itu pula yang membentuk keintimannya dengan karya-karya yang ia buat.

either. So far, Handiwirman’s works also hint at an intent to combine, merge, and unify one, two, or more materials with different visual characteristics, for example the soft and the sharp, the fragile and the sturdy. This becomes evident when one observes, for example, his works presenting human hairs joined together with small folds of plastic garbage. Another work shows his arrangement of light pieces of Styrofoam, shaped into a seemingly solid three dimensional object. As one observes his works, our mental perceptions about the characters of the mundane materials and objects are provoked. We often encounter surprises and find ourselves with questions owing to the often peculiar forms of the works, especially with his three-dimensional works.

Handiwirman’s works have also been based on his peculiar manner in perceiving the relations among objects, and the relationship between objects and humans (personally as well as socially). Apart from that, he also likes to observe how objects can trigger mental reflections in us. Handiwirman even has unique personal and emotional bonds with certain materials such as hairs, rubber bands, silicone rubber, and paper. His penchant in observing and collecting mundane materials, which to others are simply waste, has begun since he was a small child. It is also such a background that has shaped his intimate rapport with the works he makes.

Handiwirman sees any object or material, natural or synthetic—metal, rubber, resin, wood, fabric, thread, Styrofoam, etc.—as an entity with certain quality and potential. He can, for example, explain well how pieces of hair trapped in a bar of soap are difficult to remove using wet fingers; how water leakage on the ceiling can create stains resembling certain images; or how a wrinkled part of a T-shirt might remind us to the shape of a closed eye. To him, these are all (visual) phenomena revealing the distinct structure or “grammar” of a material.

Another thing that is characteristic of him is how he goes about his work. For him, the term of “arranging” or “composing” is not enough to explain his artistic practices so far. The way he

dan berbentuk gumpalan tak beraturan jika tak terendam dan terkikis oleh aliran air.

Komposisi panoramik foto ini memancing imajinasi saya tentang suatu panggung bertipe proscenium, di mana kita sebagai penonton tengah memandang objek-objek di dalamnya sebagai aktor-aktor yang tertata secara horisontal dalam suatu adegan. Pada panggung itu kita menemukan bagaimana foto ini tidak sekadar menampilkan panorama ‘alam’ sebagai fenomena tampilnya tetumbuhan, sungai dan lansekap belaka. Tepat di bagian tengah, kita menangkap objek atau ‘aktor’ utama foto ini. Bagian ini terlihat mencolok, karena di tengah nuansa alam berwarna kecoklatan dan hijau yang dominan, kita justru menangkap benda-benda dengan bentuk dan warna-warna yang ‘asing’. Di situ, terlihat rumpun bambu yang sebagian cabangnya menjulur-julur dan menjorok ke sungai. Pada cabang-cabang itu, lembar-lembar sampah plastik, kain dan benda-benda lainnya tersangkut, terjurai dan bergelantungan secara acak.

Sampai di sini kita beroleh dugaan tentang pemandangan Sungai Kontheng yang surut, sehingga ranting-ranting yang semula terendam air pasang berubah menyerupai ‘tali jemuran’ yang menangkap benda-benda yang lewat: serpihan kain, sobekan plastik dan potongan-potongan sampah-sampah ‘industrial’ lainnya. Sampah-sampah itu melekat, tergantung, tersangkut, bahkan menutupi segenap bagian ranting bambu, memberikan kesan kuat tentang proses pertemuan, penyatuan, atau barangkali, ‘suatu senyawa’ antara sampah dan alam. Saya pikir, inilah tanda-tanda yang bisa memberi petunjuk penting untuk memahami praktik artistik Handiwirman.

3/ TABIAT ARTISTIK

Dari foto Sungai Kontheng yang surut saya ingin beranjak terlebih dahulu dengan mengamati karya-karya Handiwirman. meskipun tidak ada tuntutan untuk membahasnya secara rinci, tidak dapat disangkal bahwa dalam proses persiapan, saya sudah terlanjur melihat proses pembuatan karya-karya instalasi Handiwirman untuk pameran ini. Selain itu,

only present the panorama of the nature as mere phenomena of plants, river, and landscape. Right in the middle, we see the main object, or “actor”, of the photograph. That part looks conspicuous, because amid the brownish and greenish hues of the nature, we see objects whose shapes and colors look “foreign”. There we see the bamboo groove with roots and shoots toward the river. On the roots we see pieces of plastic waste, cloth, and other objects attached to them, dangling randomly.

Here we might already have certain estimations about the view of Kontheng River, whose water was receding, enabling us to see the roots and shoots that had normally been submerged under the water flow, which now appear like “clothes line” on which the passing objects were hung: pieces of fabric, plastic, and other “industrial” waste. The garbage are attached to the roots, hanging and dangling, and even covering parts of the bamboo, creating a strong impression of a process of encounter, unification, or, perhaps, a “fusion” between waste and nature. I think these are the signs that might provide us with significant hints for us to understand Handiwirman’s artistic practices.

3/ ARTISTIC ATTITuDE

From the ebbing Kontheng River, I wish to move on by first observing the works that Handiwirman has made. Although there is no demand to discuss about the works in details, it is undeniable that during the preparation I have followed the process in which the works of installation were made for this exhibition. Apart from that, images of Handiwirman’s works of installation have already been strongly imprinted in my mind. Therefore, before I return to the picture, I wish to discuss about Handiwirman’s artistic attitude that has been familiar to me.

In Handiwirman’s works of installation so far, characters of mundane materials (hairs, Styrofoam, cotton balls, plastic, threads, pieces of paper, cigarette butts, etc) are re-presented, not in a thoroughly novel manner, but not simply as they are

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karya Handiwirman (misalnya pada kehadiran instalasi plastik kresek raksasa sebagai representasi persoalan ‘limbah’ atau ‘konsumerisme’), bagi saya penekanan pada kualitas dan struktur ‘bahasa’ benda-benda atau material adalah aspek yang justru lebih menonjol.

4/ BENDA-BENDA ‘IN-SITu’

untuk proyek Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk kali ini, Handiwirman mengerjakan sejumlah instalasi berukuran besar dengan rujukan pada dunia benda-benda yang diamatinya. Boleh jadi, sepanjang karirnya, baru pada pameran kali ini Handiwirman menampilkan karya-karya yang hampir seluruhnya berukuran gigantik. Selain meniru dan memperbesar skala benda temuan seperti bungkusan plastik kresek, ia juga menyajikan instalasi yang merupakan ‘pembesaran’ benda-benda rakitan dengan material-material yang telah ia tekuni, seperti busa, akar, dahan dan ranting pohon, kain dan logam.

Dalam konteks praktik artistik Handiwirman, seluruh rangkaian proses perwujudan karyanya bisa difahami sebagai suatu upaya ‘pembebasan’, terutama pembebasan dari konvensi bahasa benda-benda dalam kebudayaan material kita selama ini. Dalam dunia sehari-hari, benda-benda terhubung dengan kita oleh konvensi sosial, seperti fungsi, nilai tanda dan nilai ekonomi. Sudah lama cara pandang kita untuk melihat pentingnya sebuah benda selalu ditentukan oleh bagaimana ia dapat mempermudah pekerjaan, memberikan keuntungan atau prestise kepada manusia. Handiwirman justru secara unik melabrak hubungan-hubungan itu dengan menemukan, mengamati, memilih, memungut dan menyatukan serpihan-serpihan benda-benda kecil dan seringkali mundan, yang biasanya berserakan dan sia-sia. Di sisi lain, di tangan Handiwirman, penyatuan benda-benda remeh-temeh itu menghasilkan kualitas misterius, yang mungkin menghambat upaya kita untuk segera menangkap makna dan tujuannya. Kita ditarik ke dalam permainan bahasa visual yang ganjil dan absurd. Dalam proses merakit, ia membebaskan benda-benda itu dari konteks fungsi dan nilai yang stereotipe.

an effort of “liberation”, especially the liberation from the conventions of the language of objects in our material culture. In the common world, objects are related to us through social conventions such as functions, the value of signs, and economic values. Our perception about the significance of an object has been determined by how it can assist us in our work, gives benefit or prestige to us. Handiwirman peculiarly challenges such relations by discovering, observing, selecting, picking, and merging the pieces of small and often mundane objects that are usually lying about and futile. In Handiwirman’s hands, the merging of such mundane objects gives rise to a certain mysterious quality that might hamper our effort to grasp its meaning and objection. We are taken into a play of peculiar and absurd visual language. In the process of assembling, Handiwirman liberates the objects from the stereotypical context of their functions and values.

Similarly, as Handiwirman enlarges the small objects in an uncommon scale, he succeeds in erasing the signifier aspect that had been bound to our perception about the futile and banal objects. The mundane, small objects that had been “subjugated” by human power were transformed into something that dominates our sight. One might perceive it as an artistic process that eventually liberates the world of objects from the burdens of associations, conventions, and meanings: liberation through the play of the objects’ languages.

For the project “Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk”, Handiwirman prepares a specific presentation strategy. He places his works of installation in another habitat: in the middle of a river, a grass field, and an open land. Thus, the works, which are the enlargement of small materials, once again undergo a change of context due to the dimension of the open space that tends to be infinite. Furthermore, by employing such a method, Handiwirman also intends to question the understanding about “the art space”. So far, conventional art spaces such as galleries and museums are often considered as “institutional tools” that are able to give certain aesthetic aura to any objects (urinary, a pile of bricks, mud, etc) that are placed

Bagi Handiwirman, benda atau material apapun, yang alamiah maupun sintetik—logam, karet, resin, kayu, kain, benang, busa, dll.—dilihatnya sebagai entitas yang punya kualitas dan potensi ‘bahasa’ tertentu. Sebagai contoh, ia dapat menjelaskan dengan baik bagaimana helai-helai rambut terjebak pada sabun batangan tidak dapat dengan mudah dihilangkan dengan jari-jari tangan yang basah; bagaimana rembesan air pada langit-langit yang bocor dapat menciptakan noda yang menyerupai gambar tertentu, atau ketika sebuah bagian keriput dari T-shirt dapat mengingatkan kita pada bentuk mata yang terpejam. Baginya semua itu adalah fenomena (visual) yang memperlihatkan ‘struktur’ atau ‘tata bahasa’ tersendiri dari suatu material.

Hal lain yang khas dalam karya-karya Handiwirman adalah soal tindakannya dalam bekerja. Dalam kamus kerjanya, istilah ‘menyusun’ atau ‘merakit’ tidaklah cukup untuk mendefinisikan praktik artistiknya selama ini. Caranya mengolah benda-benda tidak hanya melibatkan aspek-aspek teknis yang spesifik seperti menyobek, memotong, menjahit, merangkai, menambal, meniru, mencetak, dsb., demi mencapai suatu kemudahan atau kepraktisan. Ia juga tak segan-segan melanggar cara-cara kerja atau metode konvensional yang galib diterapkan pada suatu material. misalnya, pada saat-saat tertentu, ia berani menangani langsung bahan-bahan kimiawi yang berbahaya tanpa prosedur yang aman dan seharusnya, demi untuk bersentuhan langsung dengan sifat-sifat khususnya.

memahami tabiat personal dan artistik Handiwirman, maka kita dapat mulai menduga-duga hubungan antara foto pemandangan di pinggiran kali Kontheng yang sekilas terkesan remeh-temeh itu dengan karya-karya instalasinya yang ia buat untuk pameran ini. Serpihan sampah yang menempel pada ranting-ranting bambu itu memang bisa menyiratkan petanda tentang polusi lingkungan, atau jejak-jejak industrialisasi di pinggiran kota. Akan tetapi bukan persoalan itu yang saya pikir menjadi paling penting dalam konteks pameran ini. meskipun kita selalu bisa menafsirkan, atau menemukan asosiasi-asosiasi simbolik dalam karya-

works with the objects does not only involve specific technical aspects such as ripping, cutting, sewing, organizing, patching, copying, shaping, etc, in order to achieve certain practical or easy method. He does not hesitate to break way with certain conventional methods usually applied to a material. At times, for example, he dares dealing with dangerous chemical without heeding safety procedures, in order to have a direct contact with the specific natures of the material.

As we begin to understand Handiwirman’s personal and artistic attitude, we could start making a guess about the relation between the picture of the riverbank landscape from the Kontheng River, which at a glance seems so trivial, and the works of installation that he has made for this exhibition. Pieces of garbage on the bamboo shoots and roots might signify pollutions in the nature, or traces of industrialization in the suburbs. However, I don’t think that it is the most significant issue in the context of this exhibition. Although we can always interpret or discover symbolic associations in Handiwirman’s works (for example in the presence of a gigantic plastic bag representing the issue of “waste” or “consumerism”), I think the emphasis on the quality and the “linguistic” structure of the objects or materials is of greater importance here.

4/ IN SITu OBJECTS For the current project of “Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk” (No Roots, No Shoots), Handiwirman created a number of large installations with reference to the world of objects that he has been observing. One can say that throughout his career, it is only now that Handiwirman presents works that are almost entirely gigantic in size. Apart from copying and enlarging the scale of found objects such as plastic bags, he also presents works of installation that are the “enlargement” of assembled objects with the materials familiar to him, such as the Styrofoam, roots, tree branches, fabric, and metal.

In the context of Handiwirman’s artistic practices, the entire process in which his works are made can be understood as

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sintaksis, maka kita beroleh jukstaposisi yang menarik, yakni antara pemandangan sehari-hari yang ‘estetik’ dengan ‘objek-objek estetik’ yang ditempatkan dalam situasi keseharian. Inilah barangkali yang disasar oleh Handiwirman dalam tajuk proyeknya yang puitik, Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk. menutup tulisan ini saya tengah membayangkan suatu entitas hidup yang tak punya sejarah dan masa depan sekaligus, terputus dalam cakrawala waktu, menjadi fragmen yang nirkala, tak bernama. Buat banyak orang, membayangkan hal semacam itu tentu saja sukar, kalau bukan mustahil. Bagi Handiwirman semua itu dimungkinkan melalui spekulasi dan eksperimentasi.

Demikian halnya, ketika ia memperbesar benda-benda kecil itu dengan skala perbandingan yang tak biasa, ia berhasil menghilangkan aspek penanda yang semula terikat pada persepsi kita tentang hal-hal yang remeh temeh dan sia-sia. Benda-benda kecil yang semula ‘tunduk’ pada kuasa manusia itu kini bertransformasi menjadi sesuatu yang berbalik mendominasi pandangan kita. Semua itu bisa kita lihat sebagai proses artistik yang pada akhirnya melepaskan dunia benda dari beban-beban asosiasi, konvensi dan makna: Suatu pembebasan melalui permainan bahasa benda-benda itu sendiri.

untuk proyek Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk, Handiwirman menyiapkan strategi presentasi yang khusus. Kali ini ia menempatkan karya-karya instalasinya di habitat yang lain: di tengah sungai, lapangan rumput dan tanah terbuka. Dengan begitu, karya-karya yang merupakan hasil pembesaran benda-benda kecil lantas kembali mengalami perubahan konteks karena dimensi ruang terbuka yang cenderung tak terbatas. Lebih jauh, dengan cara itu ia juga bermaksud mempersoalkan batasan tentang ‘ruang seni’. Selama ini, ruang seni yang konvensional seperti galeri dan museum seringkali dianggap sebagai ‘perangkat institusional’ yang mampu memercikkan aura estetik pada benda-benda apapun (urinoir, tumpukan batu bata, lumpur, dsb.) yang berada di dalamnya. Dengan menempatkannya di ruang terbuka, ia seperti tengah menguji sejauh mana karya-karya itu dapat disebut sebagai ‘seni’. Ini juga barangkali suatu upaya ‘pembebasan’ dengan cara yang lain lagi.

Sampai pada penjelasan ini, kita semakin memahami bagaimana sikap artistik Handiwirman berhubungan dengan upayanya untuk mengeksplorasi dampak psikologis dan makna benda-benda dalam konteks tertentu. untuk Handiwirman bagian paling menarik dalam proyek ini justru terletak pada ketegangan yang mungkin timbul antara tujuan pribadi, bahasa yang disampaikan oleh ‘objek-objeknya’, dan refleksi mental pemirsa ketika menyaksikan sesuatu yang akrab sekaligus ganjil. menempatkan foto Kali Kontheng dengan instalasi-instalasi di ruang terbuka itu ke dalam suatu

within them. By placing the works in an open air, Handiwirman seems to be testing how far the works can still be considered “art”. It is perhaps yet another way of “liberation”.

As we arrive to such an explanation, we can better understand how Handiwirman’s artistic stance is related to his efforts in exploring the psychological impacts of the objects and the meanings they have in certain contexts. To him, the most interesting part of the project lies in the possible tension between the personal intention, the language conveyed by “his objects”, and the mental reflection on the part of the audience when they see something that is familiar and peculiar at the same time. As we syntactically position the picture of Kontheng River in the midst of the works of installation in the open air, we arrive at an interesting juxtaposition between the everyday sight that is aesthetic in nature and the “aesthetic objects” placed in daily situations. This is perhaps what Handiwirman wishes to target with his poetic project of Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk (No Roots, No Shoots). Closing this essay, I envision a living entity that has no history and simultaneously no future, orphaned in a temporal horizon, becoming a timeless fragment, having no name. most people might find it difficult to imagine such a thing—if not downright impossible. To Handiwirman, it is all possible through speculations and experiments.

benda-benda in-situ: tak berakar, tak berpucuk / objects in-situ: no roots, no shoots

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 1

2010 - 2011

STEEL PLATE, TREE’S ROOT, PARAFFIN LAmP, AuTO PAINT

305 x 560 x 260 Cm

phoTographed By anan prayz

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deTails from Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 1

phoTographed By anan prayz

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 2

2010 - 2011

RESIN FIBER, AuTOPAINT, PLASTIC ROPES

155 x 210 x 170 Cm

phoTographed By agung sukindra

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 3

2010 - 2011

RESIN FIBER, AuTOPAINT, PLASTIC ROPES

155 x 210 x 170 Cm

phoTographed By BianToro sanToso

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insTallaTion view from Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 2 & 3

phoTographed By BianToro sanToso

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 4

2010

RESIN FIBER, SILICONE GLuE, SCREEN PRINT PuFF INK,

CLOTH, PLASTIC, ACRyLIC PAINT

173 x 240 x 115 Cm

phoTographed By BianToro sanToso

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deTails from Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 4

phoTographed By BianToro sanToso

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 5

2010-2011

RESIN FIBER, SCREEN PRINT PuFF INK, CLOTH, PLASTIC,

CORRuGATED ROOF SHEET, WIRE, ACRyLIC PAINT

339 x 255 x 116 Cm

phoTographed By BianToro sanToso

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 5

2010-2011

RESIN FIBER, SCREEN PRINT PuFF INK, CLOTH, PLASTIC,

CORRuGATED ROOF SHEET, WIRE, ACRyLIC PAINT

339 x 255 x 116 Cm

phoTographed By BianToro sanToso

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 6

2010-2011

RESIN FIBER, SCREEN PRINT PuFF INK,

CLOTH, STEEL, ACRyLIC PAINT

186 x 396 x 270 Cm

phoTographed By anan prayz

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deTails from Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 6

phoTographed By anan prayz

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 7

2011

PLyWOOD, CLOTH, CORRuGATED ROOF SHEET, SCREEN

PRINT PuFF INK, STEEL, ACRyLIC PAINT

3 PCS ( 247 x 122 x 122 Cm EACH )

phoTographed By anan prayz

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deTails from Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 7

phoTographed By anan prayz

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 8

2011

SILICONE RuBBER, PLASTIC, CLOTH, PHOTOGRAPH

DImENSION vARIABLE

phoTographed By anan prayz

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Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 8

2011

C-PRINTS

20 PCS ( 30 x 240 Cm EACH )

phoTographed By anan prayz

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deTails from Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk no. 8

phoTographed By anan prayz

74 75

Handiwirman is a cofounder and member of Jendela Art Group. He was initially known for his installations of objects and found objects he composed almost without any artistic pretension. The objects – thread, wire, bits of paper, plastic lumps, and hair – were present nearly as just what they were. Such anti-esthetic tendency also appeared in his painting. Only in mid-2000 he surprisingly presented several works with neatness and fascinating realist techniques. The same thing went for his installation: it showed careful selection of materials and technical rigor. What basically remained the same was Handiwirman’s view of “beauty”. He has been searching to offer beauty out of simple things around him. To put it simply, his painting forms an extension of the still-life genre. But the emphasis of Handiwirman’s painting is on the issue of perception, the way of seeing. So the forms of objects as seen in his painting are often the two-dimensional shapes of objects he himself has made and assembled. With careful consideration he will pick materials and colors to present in configurations of ‘objects’ that provoke us to associate the perceived forms with things that are perhaps familiar in our daily life. Any definitive meanings or conclusive narrations, in case of Handiwirman’s works, are almost always be cancelled by the spacious possibilities of association on the viewers’ part.

riwayat hidup / curriculum vitae

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2005 “Open view” Biasa Art Space Bali, Indonesia “Sculpture Expanded” CP Art Space Jakarta, Indonesia “Realis(me) Banal” Gracia Art Gallery Surabaya, Indonesia “Eksodus Barang” Nadi Gallery Jakarta, Indonesia “Seni Rupa Alat Bantu” Bentara Budaya yogyakarta yogyakarta, Indonesia “Pseudo Still Life: Obyek dan Auranya” Semarang Gallery. Semarang, Indonesia “Passing on Distance” Contemporary Art in Indonesia: The 4th Generation NAF Gallery. Nagoya, Japan & Indonesia “Biasa”, KSRJ (Kelompok Seni Rupa Jendela) Nadi Gallery. Jakarta, Indonesia “Re-reading Landschap” Exhibition of Sakato group Nadi Gallery. Jakarta, Indonesia “urban-Culture” 2nd Cp Biennale, Bank Indonesia museum. Jakarta, Indonesia

2004 “Wings of Words, Wings of Color” Langgeng Gallery. magelang, Indonesia “untitled, an Assemblage of Sign” CCF. Jakarta, Indonesia “Object(ify)” Nadi Gallery. Jakarta, Indonesia “mempertimbangkan Tradisi” Sanggar Sakato The National Gallery of Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia “Barcode” 16th yogyakarta Art Festival Taman Budaya yogyakarta yogyakarta, Indonesia

2003 “30 : 30” Edwin’s Gallery Jakarta, Indonesia “In memory of 100 days of H. Widayat’s death” H. Widayat museum. mungkid, magelang, Indonesia “Borobudur” Borobudur International Festival 2003 H.Widayat museum. mungkid, magelang, Indonesia “Borobudur Agitatif” Langgeng Gallery magelang, Indonesia “Fusion Strength” performance and installation Benda Art Space. yogyakarta, Indonesia “Read” Cemeti Art House yogyakarta, Indonesia “Shock and Wave” New media Art Bandung, Indonesia “Interpellation” CP Open Biennale National Gallery of Indonesia Jakarta, Indonesia “Countrybution” 7th Jogja Biennale Taman Budaya. yogyakarta, Indonesia

2002 “Dream Project: under Construction”, Fabriek Gallery. Bandung, Indonesia “under Construction: New Dimensions of Asian

Art” Tokyo Opera City Art Gallery Tokyo, Japan “Ecstaticus mundi”, Selasar Sunaryo Art Space Bandung & Air Art House. Jakarta, Indonesia “Object”, Fabriek Gallery, Bandung, Indonesia “Tali Ikat: Fiber Connection” Taman Budaya. yogyakarta, Indonesia “Pose” by KSRJ (Kelompok Seni Rupa Jendela) Affandi museum. yogyakarta, Indonesia

2001 “Not I, Am I?”, Nadi Gallery, Jakarta, Indonesia “Pink Project”, Nadi Gallery, Jakarta, Indonesia “Contemporary Craft” National Gallery of Indonesia Jakarta, Indonesia

2000 “membuka Kemungkinan” by KSRJ (Kelompok Seni Rupa Jendela) Taman Budaya, yogyakarta & Cipta Gallery, TIm Jakarta, Indonesia

1999 “6th yogyakarta Biennale” Purna Budaya yogyakarta, Indonesia “From a Window” by KSRJ (Kelompok Seni Rupa Jendela) Bali Padma Hotel. Bali, Indonesia “Sakato” Benteng vredeburg museum yogyakarta, Indonesia

1998 “Philip morris Indonesian Art Award” National Gallery of Indonesia. Jakarta, Indonesia “ASEAN Art Award”, Hanoi, vietnam

1997 “Pelukis muda yogyakarta” Benteng vredeburg museum. yogyakarta, Indonesia “FKy IX” Benteng vredeburg museum yogyakarta, Indonesia “Philip morris Indonesian Art Award” Agung Rai museum of Art. ubud, Bali & Graha Lukisan TmII. Jakarta, Indonesia “Sakato” Purna Budaya. yogyakarta, Indonesia “Jendela” 1st exhibition of Jendela Group Purna Budaya. yogyakarta, Indonesia “Paspatria I” Bahari Hotel. Tegal, Indonesia

1996 “8th yogyakarta Art Festival” Taman Budaya yogyakarta. yogyakarta, Indonesia “Dialog Dua Kota I” Cipta Gallery TIm Jakarta, Indonesia “Alumni SmSRN” Taman Budaya Padang, Indonesia

1995 “Sakato” 1st exhibition of Sanggar Sakato Purna Budaya. yogyakarta, Indonesia “Installation Object” celebrating the day of The Human Rights, ISI. yogyakarta, Indonesia

Born January 24, 1975 in Bukittinggi West Sumatra, Indonesia

education and background1993 – 1996 Indonesian Institute of Arts (ISI), yogyakarta, Indonesia

solo exhibitions2011 “Tak Berakar, Tak Berpucuk / No Roots, No Shoots” The National Gallery of Indonesia. Jakarta, Indonesia

2009 “Things, the Order of Handiwirman” Cemeti Art House, yogyakarta, Indonesia

2008 “Nothing-Something-Nothing” Showcase Singapore 2008, Singapore Organized by Nadi Gallery “In Lingo”, CIGE 2008 Beijing, China organized by Nadi Gallery

2007 “Archaeology of a Hotel Room” Nadi Gallery. Jakarta, Indonesia

2004 “Apa-apanya Dong?” Nadi Gallery. Jakarta, Indonesia

2001 “Patah Hati; Broken Heart” Cemeti Art House. yogyakarta, Indonesia

2000 “Provocative Objects” Lontar Gallery. Jakarta, Indonesia

1999 “Benda” Benda Art Space. yogyakarta, Indonesia

selected group exhibitions2011 “Art Stage Singapore 2011” Nadi Gallery, Singapore “Collectors Stage: Asian Contemporary Art from Private Collections” Singapore Art museum, Singapore

2010 “made in Indonesia” Galerie Christian Hosp. Berlin, Germany “The Show must Go On” Celebrating The 10th anniversary of Nadi Gallery National Gallery of Indonesia. Jakarta, Indonesia “Contemporaneity: Contemporary Art in Indonesia” mOCA Shanghai. Shanghai, China “ArtHK 10” (Hong Kong International Art Fair) Nadi Gallery, Hong Kong “Classic Contemporary” Contemporary southeast asian art from the Singapore Art museum collection. SAm (Singapore Art museum). Singapore “Art+Paris+Guest” Paris, France “Pleasure of Chaos-Inside New Indonesian Art” Primo marella Gallery. milano, Italy

2009 “Jogja Jamming” Biennale Jogja X yogyakarta, Indonesia “Fluid zone: Traffic and mapping” Jakarta Biennale Grand Indonesia Shopping Town Jakarta, Indonesia “Beyond the Deucht” Centraal museum utrecht, Nederlands “Kado #2”, celebrating the 9th anniversary of Nadi Gallery, Nadi Gallery Jakarta, Indonesia “ArtHK 09“ (Hong Kong International Art Fair) with Nadi Gallery, Hong Kong “CIGE 2009” (China International Gallery Exposition) with Nadi Gallery Beijing, China “Jendela – A Play of the Ordinary” NuS museum, Singapore

2008 “Coffee, Cigarettes and Pad Thai” Contemporary Art in Southeast Asia. Eslite Gallery Taipei, Taiwan “Bentuk – Bentuk: Contemporary Indonesian Art in 3D” melbourne Art Fair 2008. Organized by Nadi Gallery & valentine Willie Fine Art melbourne, Australia “Alfi: Painting Series” & “Handiwirman Saputra: Exterior, Inside view—Interior, Outside view” ShContemporary 08. Organized by Nadi Gallery Shanghai, China “Expose #1 - A Presentation of Indonesian Contemporary Art by Deutsche Bank & Nadi Gallery”, Four Seasons Hotel Jakarta, Indonesia “manifesto” National Gallery of Indonesia Jakarta, Indonesia “Inanimate Performance” Soka Art Center. Taipei, Taiwan

2007 ”Cilukba! / Peekaboo!” by KSRJ (Kelompok Seni Rupa Jendela) valentine Willie Fine Art Kuala Lumpur, malaysia “Soka’s view” Southeast Asian Contemporary Art, Soka Contemporary Space. Beijing, China & Taipei, Taiwan “China International Gallery Exposition” Langgeng Gallery. Beijing, China “Indonesian Contemporary Art Now” Nadi Gallery, Jakarta

2006 ”Belief” Singapore Biennale 2006. City Hall, Singapore “Passing on Distance” Contemporary Art in Indonesia: The 4th Generation, Base Gallery Tokyo, Japan “ICON : Retrospective” Jogja Gallery yogyakarta, Indonesia

ucapan terima kasih / acknowledgment

Dessy, Nam dan Ilamas Biantoro, mbak meli and familyJendela (yusra, yunizar, Alfi, Rudi)Nadi GalleryGaleri Nasional IndonesiaEnin SupriyantoAgung HujatnikajennongAgus SuwageTubagus AndreIcuz (Artnivora)Sudjuanda (mahameru)Heri Pemad art managementAnan PrayzAgung SukindraAsmudjoAmrizalArief yudiTopanWahyu Hidayat ‘Gogon’‘umplong’ A. PriyantoHulqWintoloand for everyone who supported this project

nadi galleryJl. kemBang indah iii Blok g iii no. 4 - 5 puri indah JakarTa 11610, indonesia.p. (62-21) 5818129 f. (62-21) 5805677 e. nadigallery@gmail.comwww.nadigallery.com

the national gallery of indonesiaJl. medan merdeka Timur no. 14JakarTa, indonesia 10110p. (62-21) 34833954 f. (62-21) 3813021e. galnas@indosaT.neT.idwww.galeri-nasional.or.id

This book was published as a supplement to the solo show by Handiwirman Saputra “Tak Berakar Tak Berpucuk / No Roots No Shoots”at The National Gallery of IndonesiaJakarta, march 29th - April 5th 2011

Curated by Enin Supriyanto and Agung Hujatnikajennong

Translated by Rani Elsanti AmbyoFront & back inside cover “Sungai” photographed by Handiwirman SaputraOther photographed by Agung Sukindra, Anan Prayz, Biantoro Santoso, Enin SupriyantoDesigned by Artnivora, www.artnivora.netPrinted in Indonesia by mahameru Offset Printing

Published by Nadi GalleryJl. Kembang Indah III Blok G III no. 4 - 5 Puri Indah Jakarta 11610, Indonesiap. (62-21) 5818129 f. (62-21) 5805677 e. nadigallery@gmail.comwww.nadigallery.com

©Nadi Gallery - 073/2011