Abdi Alam
Abdi Alam pt.1 exhibits remnants of a weaver’s forest ruminations during his pilgrimage in Merubetiri National Park (2017) and Gunung Gede Pangrango (2021). The abandonment of roots, deforestation of a family, and the shedding of change are several extensions of Alexander Sebastianus’s (b.1995) contemplation throughout his cyanotype prints and woven studies. A line represents a single tree, a woven cloth embodies a whole forest.
The traditional lurik weaving motif, telupat symbolizes the sacred barrier worn by the loyal servant to protect the royal palace. Abdi Hutan (2021 – end) is on-going installation that re-sacralize lurik weavings as forest guardians at the age of the Anthropocene. Wrapped and armored in hues of Indigofera, trees are protected and blessed from illegal loggers at the borders of an endangered forest. Exhibited at Abdi Alam pt.1 in Omah Budoyo Gallery, Jogjakarta the pilot installation will extend with forest conservators across Java, starting with the Merubetiri National Park, Java.
A. Sebastianus Hartanto
Alexander Sebastianus Hartanto (b. 1995) sees ethnographic research as an experiential mode of existence. His works explore the decontextualization of material cultures and how they are perceived, understood and ritualized in practice. For Sebastianus, decolonizing the ontologies of art is to reclaim Sani, a way of living that involves offering, service and search of the unknown. Such a practice leads to a recreation of pilgrimages, sacred spaces and woven cloths, all of which may or may not be archived, documented or shared. In Sani, what is left are remnants and evidence of materials.
A. Sebastianus Hartanto is an artist who achieved the William Daley Award for Excellence in Art History and Craft in 2017. Trained as an apprentice in his grandmother’s hometown in East Java, he mastered the art of weaving, which has become essential in his exploration of visual and material ontology. Currently he works at Rumah Sukkha Citta in Java as an ethnographer and developer of textile crafts.
