It is clear that Bali has given much inspiration for Carola Vooges. Her career as an artist began a few years ago when she settled in Bali. However, she has apparently long harbored much interest, as well as been involved, in the world of visual art. Even though Vooges is strongly influenced by the Balinese local potentials, and has used these potentials in her works, her works do not betray such influences. It seems that Vooges has kept some visual scenarios in her mind for a long time. When she arrived in Bali, she was able to realize those scenarios with the help of the highly skilled Balinese sculptors. Although she uses much of the Balinese local colors, and she might have also been inspired by the Balinese nature, Vooges's works, however, represent the ideas of a cosmopolitan artist; they do not reveal any ethnographic references.

Vooges's works manage to show the sensuality of forms. The objects bear myriad of extraordinary potentials. It is our disposition to admire the nature, and yet, we often "forget" this very nature, especially our natural environment such as the plants, the sea creatures, or the stones. Objects that strongly betray the images of the nature are thus born. They are made of natural matters and resemble the nature, but are not the nature itself. The objects are human-made, the results of an artist's inspirations. The works are admired precisely because they are not the nature itself.

The strength of Vooges's works is not in the craftsmanship, nor is it in its resemblance with the nature. Instead, it is in their ability to represent "their beings" as aesthetic objects. Vooges's works do not appear like sculptures, and neither do they come up as decorative objects. The works can be categorized into the genre of "objects," that is to say that the works exist in intermediate dimensions; they can appear as abstract or semi-abstract works, they can even appear resembling the nature. When such "object works" appear in some abstract forms, it is not done in the effort to work analytically on the question of forms. Similarly, when they resemble the nature, they do so not in order to imitate the nature. All possible variables in creating "object works" exist merely as references. The important thing is the strength of the object itself as the aesthetic manifestation. This sounds similar to the concept of modernist works, yet it is different from modernism. This is obvious in the intimate atmosphere of Vooges's works--humanistic but also personal.

In Vooges's works, wood is a material in itself. Her works, however, reveal strongly the hallmarks of both the wood and the natural objects from where they are derived. Vooges mostly borrow the characters of sea objects and creatures. The two different things--wood and underwater objects--merge harmoniously in Vooges works, without betraying any awkwardness. This reveals the artist's sensibility and mastery in working on the potentials of her immediate environment, without intricate pretensions, and armed only with some simple concepts.

Asmudjo Jono Irianto

Born on August 16, 1958 in Haarlem, Holland.
Studied at Special Classes Rietvield Academy, Amsterdam; Filmmaking Course, Film Academy, Amsterdam.

SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2001 Ganesha Gallery, Four Seasons Resort, Bali.
2003 Ganesha Gallery, Four Seasons Resort, Bali.
2004 Ganesha Gallery, Four Seasons Resort, Bali; West fries Museum, Hoorn, Holland.

SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2001 Indonesia Contemporary Craft, National Gallery.

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