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Jim
Supangkat's Last Harbor
Arif Firmansjah
TEMPO
September 25, 2003
When the CP Open Biennale is opened in the beginning of last September
at the National Gallery of Indonesia in Jakarta, Jim Supangkat looked
very busy. He moved from one place to another, greeting the coming visitors.
In fact, Jim has been busy preparing the event since the beginning"it
was thus not only during the opening night that he had been busy. Since
mid 2002, the campaign for the biennale has been conducted in various
cities and towns. The campaign was held to invite artists to participate
in the event, and to introduce the biennale and its theme. As the result
of the campaign, the committee received around 700 proposals from various
artists. After the selection by the curatorial team headed directly by
Jim Supangkat, 123 works are accepted to be displayed in the biennale.
"The most complicated process of the biennale was indeed the curating
of those hundreds of works," admits the renowned curator.
As an international biennale that carries domestic dimensions, it is
indeed difficult to decide which work that could be included in the biennale.
This is especially hard as the biennale is projected to be a part of the
existing international biennales. Some new dimensions are inserted so
that the CP Open Biennale is different from similar events in other countries.
It is interesting to note that Jim Supangkat includes craft works as a
part of the works displayed in the biennale. This is a bold move as in
other countries craft works are often considered as having no artistic
values and as being merely a part of the leisure industry.
The new works are displayed in the CP Open Biennale alongside paintings,
installation works, and sculptures, which are the main "tenants"
of the biennale. The bold steps are taken in line with the "interpellation"
theme that seeks to break the domination of the artistic beliefs of Europe
and United States. "With this event we want to offer new passions,"
says the tall, well-built man.
To be able to read and arrange the works in a biennale, a curatorial
acumen is needed. This is important so that the lay public can rightly
read the mission of an exhibition. It is a pity that such needs cannot
always be fulfilled. Indonesia does not have the specific educational
materials necessary to produce curators. The existing curators usually
come with a background in art. "Just like myself," says Jim
Supangkat.
Due to Dissatisfaction
At first, the man who was born in Makassar on May 2, 1948, was known
as a sculptor. His parents had wanted him to become a medical doctor,
as his father dr. Supangkat Danusaputra had been. Unfortunately, the man
who liked to protest his teachers during high school found art to be more
interesting. The Faculty of Art in Bandung Institute of Technology became
his educational harbor after finishing high school.
His penchant for protesting found another outlet when he became a sculptor
in the mid seventies. Together with S. Prinka, Dede Eri Supria, and Hardi,
Jim Supangkat came forward with the Gerakan Seni Rupa Baru (the New Art
Movement), as a harbor for artists to realize and work on ideas that are
uncommon for the time. "We wanted to offer new dimension in art,"
he says.
Some differences that surfaced in the movement then led him to choose
his own path. He found a new harbor as an art editor in the Zaman magazine
until he then moved to Tempo magazine. "But my main profession was
still as an artist," states the husband of Altje Ully Panjaitan.
Altje Ully is a sculptor herself, and was once Jim"s student at the
Jakarta Art Institute. It is while working as an art editor that Jim"s
ability to read a work of art and write about it is systematically sharpened.
As an artist, Jim has produced works that are widely recognized, at least
if the quality of the works are measured with the awards that he has received.
In 1975, his work, entitled Torn, received the Sprenson Memorial Award
from the Faculty of Art, Bandung Institute of Technology. In the writing
world, his essay on architecture has won the Indonesian Architect Association
Award in 1985.
His journey as an artist became even longer as his works were displayed
in exhibitions in Indonesia and abroad. But the tens and tens of exhibitions
he had attended raised some grave questions in himself. "I start
to become dissatisfied with my works," explains the man whose full
name is Jim Abiyasa Supangkat Silaen. The restlessness became stronger
in the beginning of the nineties.
At the same time, Jim remembered the information he had once received
about the world of art in the United States and Europe. The art world
in the United States was full of upheavals in mid eighties and the upheavals
gave birth to a critical attitude toward the organizational system in
museums. Curators in museums served only as a bureaucratic body and were
concerned merely with the administrative routines. Susan Sondakh was one
of the actors who voiced the critical attitude of the artists. Such upheavals
then triggered the birth of the independent curators, who were not attached
to a particular museum and were free to conduct dialogues with living
artists.
The upheavals in United States moved Jim Supangkat to go further. The
profession of curatorship caught his interest, as he had wanted to do
something new. In 1990, Jim thus declared his profession as an independent
curator. His first trial was as the curator of The Jakarta Institute of
Art, which was founded in 1990 but dissolved two years later, due to insufficient
fund.
Like in its country of birth, the phrase "independent curator"
invited debates and controversies, especially as there were no Indonesian
museums that functioned just like museums in United States and Europe.
Many thought that Jim was too early to declare himself an independent
curator. Although becoming the focus of sharp debates, Jim was certain
that Indonesia needed this profession, especially as the development of
Indonesian art was sufficiently good.
To be able to know Indonesian art, the international world could not
possibly relate directly with the artists. "What they would seek
first was certainly the local curator," says the former lecturer
of the Jakarta Art Institute and Trisakti University. It was as if Jim"s
new profession received a blessing. Jim saw that Japan started to enter
the Indonesian art scene with the Japan Foundation. Jim was right, as
the foundation later became his sponsor to travel around Japan and visit
museums in the country in order to learn the curatorial art.
"Learning by doing""that was what Jim did in order to
become a curator, as there are no formal institution that prepare someone
for this profession. To be able to work as a curator, a knowledge and
mastery of basic art and art history are necessary. This last requirement
is nowhere to be found in Indonesia. In Asia, only Japan and China have
the special institutions that teach art history, their graduates earn
the title of artis story. "One of the field where those graduates
work is the curatorial one," explains Jim.
Jim Supangkat, who was only educated in art at the Bandung Institute
of Technology, was lucky to have a distinct passion. Furthermore, his
thesis on aesthetic had required him to learn philosophy for a year in
Gadjah Mada University. The requirement to be able to read works philosophically
has thus been fulfilled early on. Added to the passion is his interest
in reading literatures that he receives from his colleagues in United
States and Europe.
Jim has now become not only a masterful curator, but also a point of
reference for young curators who have lately mushroomed. Just like his
experience in his old days, Jim often asks young curators like Asmudjo
to work together, so that everyone will be able to share his or her knowledge
and experiences in order to become a good curator. It is in this last
harbor that Jim finds his satisfaction.
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