Fetish, Objects, Art Project #1 at Biasa Art Space

Tiarma Sirait's performance of Synthetic love for the opening of Biasa Art Space in Jakarta was part of the Fetish, Objects, Art Project #1 exhibition, shown here after its Bali premiere. Synthetic Love featured pink, body-suited, long-limbed, beautiful girls, with bulging breasts and bellies, linked together by a 20-meter-long penis. The hilarious performance was a critique on the treatment of the body commodity,

Indeed, rather than obscene scenes or dark mystique, the idea of the exhibition was based on the Marxist theory on commodity fetishism, a form of idolatry about the values placed on commodities. Fetishism in those days was commonly used in the study of primitive religions, and Marx's application to his theory on fetishism of commodities suggests that such primitive belief system exists at the heart of modern society.

Fetishism has long been a theme in Astari Rasjid's work, showing how the traditional 'jimat' or charm, used to protect a person from evil, has been transformed within modern society into the branded items that are favored today to foster a person's esteem. While Astari, in the Bali exhibition, showed a long torso and a branded bag adorned with a pistols and bullets, in the Jakarta Fetish show she had a big branded bag with the carved word Fake. The same issue is found in Mella Jaarsma's boxer shorts, covered with brochures highlighting herbal potions for strength and manliness.

Of a different kind of fetishistic work was the mixed-media painting by I Gak Murniasih or Murni. In this work her public hair-collected over 20 years- was an important part of the work. This work was made just before she died of cancer in early 2006.

Regretfully, the star of the Bali Fetish, Pintor Sirait's life-size stainless steel sculpture of a Formula 1 racing car could not be taken to Jakarta. Measuring 470 x 200 x 145 centimeters and weighing almost 300 kilograms the sculpture was sold at the Larasati's October auction in Singapore. The much smaller format in the Jakarta exhibition did not have the luster of the life-size model in the Bali exhibition.

Not all of the 34 artists whose work appeared in the shows worked around the fetish theme. Some works were just critical observations of today's human alienation amidst over-whelming media information. Angki Prubandono's Miss Universe, a light box showing the iconic figure, or the tote-bag in the form of a Burberry textile covered weapon by Wiyoga Muhardanto, were two fine examples of this.

Other artists, however, were taken by the craze and their excitement towards certain objects or commodities, as was evident in Yuli Prayitno's intimate relationship with his bike, twisting 'my girl friend' for 'my bike friend' in the title and making the bike's saddle in the form of a girl's hand. Agus Suwage, who understands the risks of smoking but is unable to quit cigarettes, combined his dependency on cigarettes with his fascination with music in Nicotine Glamour, which featured an aluminum skull, a la Damien Hirst, amidst cigarette butts.

- Carla Bianpoen -