Pollination #3 is organized by The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre in Ho Chi Minh City. Commissioned curators LIR (Yogyakarta) and Kittima Chareeprasit (Chiang Mai) invited artists Maryanto (Yogyakarta) and Ruangsak Anuwatwimon (Bangkok) to create the project ‘Of Hunters and Gatherers’. After more than a year in field research – beneath Mount Merapi’s explosive peaks and the over-dammed Mekong that gives border to Thailand and Laos – ‘The Hunters’ exhibition opened at the MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum (Chiang Mai) with an online symposia (28-30 May, 2021) and dedicated website.
SYMPOSIA DETAILS AND SCHEDULE
‘The Gatherers’
An online ‘Pollination’ symposium
28, 29, 30 May; 15.00 – 17.00 (Indonesia/Thailand/Vietnam | UTC+7)
Registration is free. Event is held in English
ZOOM: Zoom link to register available here soon!
You Tube live: Link available here soon!
DAY 1: Friday, May 28 2021
Title: “Of Hunters and Gatherers: The Conversation”
Time: 15.00 – 17.00 (Indonesia/Thailand/Vietnam | UTC+7)
Speakers: LIR (Mira Asriningtyas & Dito Yuwono), Kittima Chareeprasit, Ruangsak Anuwatwimon and Maryanto
Responder: Zoe Butt
About:
This first day unpacks the entire platform of Pollination #3: ‘Of Hunters and Gatherers’ from field research to exhibition, symposia, and a dedicated website. Since March, 2020, the curators have walked with the artists, along the erupting slopes of Mount Merapi in Yogyakarta and the dwindling shores of the Lower Mekong between Thailand and Laos. They found themselves recalling specific artists, artworks, performances and social research that are as equally concerned with their local environmental degradation, due to realities of government oversight, colonial extraction and corporate greed. Reflecting on the curator’s process of working with artists Maryanto (Yogyakarta) and Ruangsak Anuwatwimon (Bangkok), questions surrounding the nature of curatorial labor in response to artistic production will be discussed where Maryanto’s tent-like installations, composed of paintings in charcoal and earth, share local knowledge of living with respect for Nature and its spirits, concerned by the impact of illegal, corporate and government hunting of water and sand, beneath Mount Merapi; while Ruangsak’s varied sculptural installations beg acknowledgement of the many animals whose lives are jeopardized along the heavy damming of the Mekong, creating various diorama from their bones as monument to their spirits that once guarded this crucial waterway. Inspired by local folklore, sharing the lives of particular mythical ‘hunter’; comparing the ethos of such stories to our contemporary context, this session unpacks the ethos of ‘Pollination’ where sharing is mentoring, where knowledge is participation.
Rundown:
15.00 – 15.10 Introduction to ‘Pollination” by Zoe Butt
15.10 – 15.15 Welcome Speech by Heru Hikayat, In-House Curator of Selasar Sunaryo Art Space
15.15 – 15.30 LIR and Kittima Chareeprasit
15.30 – 15.45 Maryanto shares his research + artistic practice
15.45 – 16.00 Ruangsak Anuwatwimon shares his research + artistic practice
16.00 – 16.15 Presentation of the on-site research by LIR
16.15 – 16.30 Presentation of the on-site research by Kittima Chareeprasit
16.30 – 16.45 Presentation Responder: Zoe Butt
16.45 – 17.00 Open discussion Q&A lead by Heru Hikayat
BIOS OF SPEAKERS
Kittima Chareeprasit received her MA in Curating and Collections from Chelsea College of Arts and is currently curator at MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum in Chiang Mai, Thailand. In 2016, she co-founded the Waiting You Curator Lab, focusing on curatorial approaches within contemporary art practices. Her interest lies mainly in contemporary art and culture that revolve around critical history, social and political issues. She has worked on numerous projects with both emerging and established artists within the realm of Southeast Asian Art and its cultural context. Her recent curatorial work includes ‘House Calls: Pinaree Sanpitak’, 100 Tonson Foundation (2020); ‘Breast Stupa Cookery: the world turns upside down’, Nova Contemporary (2020); ‘Temporal Topography: MAIIAM’s New Acquisitions; from 2010 to Present’, MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum (2019); ‘In search of other times: reminiscence of things collected’, JWD Art Space Bangkok (2019); ;Occasionally Utility’, Gallery VER, Bangkok (2017); ‘The Thing That Takes Us Apart’, Gallery Seescape, Chiang Mai (2017)
LIR (Yogyakarta) is an art institution cum curator collective consisting of Mira Asriningtyas (b. 1986. based in Yogyakarta) and Dito Yuwono (b. 1985. based in Yogyakarta). Since 2011, LIR’s program ranges from exhibition laboratories and research-based art projects to public programs, residencies, and alternative art education platforms. LIR’s projects are characterized by multidisciplinary collaboration and often performative exhibitions; fostering continuous transgenerational transmission of knowledge, memory, and history. LIR’s most recent projects including “Curated by LIR” exhibition series (KKF – Yogyakarta, 2018 – 2020); “Transient Museum of a Thousand Conversations” (ISCP – New York, 2020); and “900mdpl” (Kaliurang – 2017, 2019, & 2021), a long-term site-specific project in Kaliurang, Indonesia—an aging resort village under an active volcano—with the aim of preserving collective memory of the space.
Maryanto creates evocative, black and white paintings, drawings, and installations that undermine the romantic language of traditional landscape painting to examine socio-political structures in the physical sites that he situated his works. Through fable-like and theatrical settings, these landscapes are subjected to the whim of colonizers and capitalists through technological development, industrialization, pollution of the land and exploitation of its natural resources. Maryanto graduated from the Faculty of Fine Art, Indonesia Institute of the Art, Yogyakarta in 2005, and completed a residency at the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam in 2013. Recent notable exhibitions include ‘Permanent Osmosis’, LIR Space, Yogyakarta (2019, solo); ‘A Journey of Forking Paths’, Yeo Workshop, Singapore (2019, solo); ‘On the Shoulders of Fallen Giants: 2nd Industrial Art Biennial’, Labin, Croatia (2018); ‘Behind the Terrain’, Koganei Art Spot Chateau, Tokyo (2018). Maryanto was born in Jakarta. He now lives and works in Yogyakarta.
Ruangsak Anuwatwimon is a Bangkok native and resident, driven and inspired by political issues and social situations that he has experienced in his own life. His artistic practice investigates the protagonist’s relationship humans have with the natural world. Employing diverse media which challenge the parameters of what constitutes an ‘artwork’, Ruangsak’s conceptual projects explore the social, cultural, and moral grounds of human societies. Notable recent projects include ‘Monstrous Phenomenon’, 1Projects, Bangkok (2019, solo); ‘Temporal Topography: MAIIAM New Acquisitions from 2010 to Present’, MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum, Chiang Mai (2019/2020); ‘Every Step in the Right Direction – Singapore Biennale’ 2019, Singapore (2019); ‘Post-Nature – A Museum as an Ecosystem: 11th Taipei Biennial’, Taipei (2018). In 2020, Ruangsak will participate in the Bangkok Art Biennale.
Zoe Butt
Zoe Butt is a curator and writer who lives in Vietnam. Her curatorial practice centres on building critically thinking and historically conscious artistic communities, fostering dialogue among countries of the global south. Currently Artistic Director of the Factory Contemporary Arts Centre, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam’s first purpose-built space for contemporary art, Zoe formerly served as Executive Director and Curator, Sàn Art, Ho Chi Minh City (2009–2016); Director, International Programs, Long March Project, Beijing (2007–2009); and Assistant Curator, Contemporary Asian Art, Queensland Art Gallery, Brisbane (2001–2007) – this latter post particularly focused on the development of its Asia-Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art. Her work has been published by Hatje Cantz; ArtReview; Independent Curators International; ArtAsiaPacific; Printed Project; Lalit Kala Akademi; JRP-Ringier; Routledge; and Sternberg Press, among others. Her curatorial projects include interdisciplinary dialogue platforms such as Conscious Realities (2013-2016); the online exhibition Embedded South(s) (2016); and group exhibitions of Vietnamese and international artists at various international venues. Recent exhibitions include Sharjah Biennial 14: Leaving the Echo Chamber – Journey Beyond The Arrow, (2019); Empty Forest: Tuan Andrew Nguyen (2018); Spirit of Friendship and Poetic Amnesia: Phan Thao Nguyen (both 2017); Dislocate: Bui Cong Khanh (2016), Conjuring Capital (2015). Zoe is a 2021 MoMA International Curatorial Fellow; a member of the Asian Art Council for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York and in 2015 was named a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum.
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DAY 2: Saturday, May 29 2021
Title: “Extraction: Resilience Amidst an Environment in Entropy”
Time: 15.00 – 17.00 (Indonesia/Thailand/Vietnam | UTC+7)
Speakers: Prilla Tania, Elizabeth D.Inandiak, Wut Chalanant, Sutthirat Supaparinya
Responder: Agung Hujatnikajennong
About:
This second day will focus on issues of environmental urgency endured in different contexts, surrounding the issue of social change and economic development, which has led to extraction as both survival and exploitation. Writer Elizabeth D.Inandiak will talk about her research on a vast centre of knowledge in Muara Jambi, a site dating back to the 7th century at the crossroad of the Buddhist Sea Route. Artist Wut Chalanant brings us through his research along the Mekong River basin where routes have been blocked by dams to create “The Battery of Southeast Asia”. Artist Sutthirat Supaparinya will share her research on energy production, especially from the damming of major rivers such as the Ping and Mekong rivers, which have had a huge impact on local community and ecology. Lastly, artist Prilla Tania presents her video work, an embodied experience of living off the grid, investigating the idea of permaculture from the perspective of Nyi Pohaci, a local Indonesian myth.
Rundown:
15.00 – 15.10 Introduction by Kittima Chareeprasit
15.10 – 15.30 Elizabeth D. Inandiak
15.30 – 15.50 Wut Chalanant
15.50 – 16.10 Sutthirat Supaparinya
16.10 – 16.35 Prilla Tania
16.35 – 16.50 Presentation Responder: Agung Hujatnikajennong
16.50 – 17.10 Open discussion Q&A lead by Kittima Chareeprasit
BIOS
Agung Hujatnikajennong
Dr. Agung Hujatnika, aka Agung Hujatnikajennong, is a freelance curator and full-time lecturer at the Faculty of Art and Design, Bandung Institute of Technology (ITB). Amongst other exhibitions he has curated are Fluid Zones, Jakarta Biennale ARENA (2009); Exquisite Corpse, Bandung Pavilion for the Shanghai Biennale (2012); Not a Dead End, Jogja Biennale – Equator #2 (2013); Passion/ Possession (2014), and; Tintin Wulia’s solo project, 1001 Martian Homes, for Indonesian Pavilion at Venice Biennale (2017). He was the initiator and artistic director for Instrumenta, an international media arts festival in Jakarta (2018-2019). Agung has been involved in several research projects on Indonesian and Southeast Asian art, including Ambitious Alignments (2013- 2015), and Shaping Indonesian Contemporary Arts – Role of the Institutions (2014-2017). His book, Kurasi dan Kuasa, on curatorial practice and power relations in the Indonesian art world, was published by Jakarta Arts Council (2015).
Elisabeth D. Inandiak
Writer, translator and public servant; born in France. From the age of 19, she began traveling the world as a journalist, writing several literary books, including the life story of Marceline Loridan Ivens, a Jewish woman who had been exiled in the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp during the second world war, and various film scenarios, including “A Tale of the Wind”, with Dutch documentary director Joris Ivens (Indonesian Calling). In 1989 she settled in Yogyakarta. She recompiled Serat Centhini, a great Javanese literary work, into a 21st century version entitled “Kekasih yang Tersembunyi”. After the earthquake on 27 May 2006, she built the Giri Gino Guno studio in Bebekan, Bantul (DIY). During the eruption of Mount Merapi on October 26, 2010, she collaborated with the Al Qodir Islamic Boarding School to accompany the residents of Kinahrejo until they got back on their feet.
From the experiences of these two natural disasters, the story of “Babad Ngalor-Ngidul” was born with illustrations by artist Heri Dono— a continuation of the book Lahirnya Kembali Beringin Putih (1999). Her latest work titled “Mimpi-Mimpi dari Pulau Emas”, was produced together with the people of Muara Jambi Village, in Sumatra, who used local wisdom, fairy tales, and the third eye as a means of excavating this extraordinary Buddhist ancient site. There, with them, she built a house of wisdom and peace: Rumah Menapo.
Prilla Tania
Prilla Tania is a multi-disciplinary artist whose works include soft sculpture, installations, videos and photos. Prilla’s works are influenced by the idea of food sovereignty and the sustainable relationship between humans and nature. Recent notable exhibitions include ‘In To The Future’, National Gallery of Indonesia, Jakarta (2019); ‘Jogja Biennale XII: Not A Dead End’, Yogyakarta (2013); ‘E’, Selasar Sunaryo Art Space, Bandung (2013, solo). Currently she is managing a garden called Leuwigoeng in Bandung focusing on organic farming and sustainable living.
Sutthirat Supaparinya
Working across media, Sutthirat Supaparinya (Som)’s artistic practice questions and interprets public information with a focus on the impact of human activities on other humans and the landscape. Through her works, she questions and interprets public information and reveals or questions what structure affects her/us as a national/ global citizen. Sutthirat seeks to cultivate freedom of expression through her art practice. Recent notable exhibitions include A Beast, a God, and a Line, MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum, Chiang Mai (2021); Noodles and the Wild Things, MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum, Chiang Mai (2020): Jogja Biennale Equator #5, Yogyakarta (2019); 12th Gwangju Biennale, Gwangju, (2018); 38th EVA International – Ireland Biennale (2018), among others.
Wut Chalanant
Wut is an artist/ photographer based in Chiang Mai, Thailand. His artistic approach involves the theme of the relationship between humans and space in the modern age. He photographic works based on his interest in the ideology of urban development, of how land is transformed through the shifting demands of the global economy, creating a void of context that opens up room for new interpretations of the realities. Wut graduated from Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst (Academy of Fine Arts Leipzig), Leipzig, Germany. Recent exhibitions include ‘Southeast X Southeast’ (2018) at Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona Beach, USA ‘most of the wild – least of the wild’(2018) , hgb leipzig (rundgang)
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DAY 3: Sunday, May 30 2021
Time: 15.00 – 17.00 (Indonesia/Thailand/Vietnam | UTC+7)
Title: “Extinction: The Impact of Humans on Our Non-Human World’
Speakers: Napak Serirak, JJ Rizal, Tita Salina, The Forest Curriculum
Responder: Vipash Purichanont
About
This third day will prod the idea of extinction and how it relates to the way humans live and how it affects non-human existence. Napak Serirak will explore deforestation and its related developmental projects in Southeast Asia which threaten wildlife and plant species. JJ Rizal explores the relation between the absence of Betawi’s* ancestors’ graveyard culture and current ecological damage in Jakarta. A little north of the graveyard of Betawi’s ancestor; Tita Salina visits a sinking island where the grave of as Islamic political leader once was, begging acknowledgement of climate refugees and its relation to the erasure of history. The Forest Curriculum’s lecture will focus on the special economic zone (SEC) in southern Johor, Malaysia and its ‘Forest City’, to rethink how environments are imagined as ‘smart’ and ‘resilient’ in an era of Capitalist greenwashing.
*(The Betawis are one of the most recently formed ethnic groups in Indonesia which are considered as a native ethnicity of Jakarta)
Rundown:
15.00 – 15.10 Introduction by LIR
15.10 – 15.30 Forest Curriculum
15.30 – 15.50 JJ. Rizal
15.50 – 16.10 Napak Serirak
16.10 – 16.25 Tita Salina
16.25 – 16.45 Presentation Responder: Vipash Purichanont
16.45 – 17.00 Open discussion Q&A lead by LIR
BIOS
JJ Rizal
JJ Rizal is an academic, historian, and founder of Penerbit Komunitas Bambu, a publishing house specializing in the humanities, history, and culture. His research focuses on the history of Batavia-Betawi-Jakarta which has been published extensively in MOESSON Het Indisch Maandblad (2001-2006) magazine (based in The Netherlands). In 2009, he received the DKI Jakarta Governor Cultural Award. His writings about Junghuhn appear in National Geographic Indonesia, and was selected as “The Best International 2010” by National Geographic International Magazine, setting aside hundreds of articles from 36 National Geographic magazines outside of America. In 2011, he received the Jakarta Book Awards IKAPI (Indonesian Publisher Association) Jakarta for being considered to have “shared knowledge and change lives through books”. Some of his publications include “Politik Kota Kita” (2006); “Onze Ong: Onghokham dalam Kenangan” (2007); “Sejarah yang Memihak: Mengenang Sartono Kartodirdjo” (2008); and “Raden Saleh: Anak Belanda, Mooi Indie dan Nasionalisme”.
Napak Serirak
Napak Serirak received his BA in Economics and MA in Anthropology from Thammasat University. Drawing from the history of sexuality, medical anthropology and linguistic anthropology, he wrote extensively on the cultural history of sexology in Thai society. In addition, his interests include colonial scientific expedition writing on Southeast Asia as well as environmental history and political ecology of nature conservation in/of the region, amongst others. He was a lecturer in Sociology and Anthropology at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Prince of Songkla University, Pattani Campus from 2013 to 2017. Napak is currently an independent researcher.
Tita Salina
In Tita Salina’s practice, intervention, installation and moving image come together in response to site-specific issues that have global resonance. 1001st island – the most sustainable island in archipelago 2015 explores transnational issues of community disenfranchisement, environmental pollution and government corruption as they manifest within the Indonesian government’s grand plan for the restoration and redevelopment of Jakarta Bay. Recent notable exhibitions include ‘Bangkok Art Biennale’, Bangkok Art and Culture Center, Bangkok (2020); The Coming World: Ecology as the New Politics 2030–2100, Garage Museum of Contemporary Art ,Moscow, Russia (2019); Irwan Ahmett and Tita Salina: The Ring of Fire (2014 – ongoing), NTU Centre for Contemporary Art Singapore, Singapore, Singapore (2019); From Bandung to Berlin: If all of the moons aligned, SAVVY Contemporary, Berlin, Germany (2016), among others.
The Forest Curriculum
The Forest Curriculum (Bangkok/Yogyakarta/Manila/Seoul/Berlin/Santa Barbara) is an itinerant and nomadic platform for interdisciplinary research and mutual co-learning, based in Southeast Asia, and operating internationally. Founded and co-directed by curators Abhijan Toto and Pujita Guha, and with Rosalia Namsai Engchuan, it works with artists, collectives, researchers, indigenous organizations and thinkers, musicians, and activists, to assemble a located critique of the Anthropocene via the naturecultures of Zomia, the forested belt that connects South and Southeast Asia. The Forest Curriculum organizes exhibitions, public programs, performances, video and multimedia projects, as well as an annual intensive in a different location around the region, which gathers practitioners from all over the world to engage in collective research and shared methodologies: The Forest And The School, Bangkok (2019); The Forest Is In The City Is In The Forest I, Manila (2020) and II, Online (2020-2021). The platform collaborates with institutions and organizations internationally, including Savvy Contemporary, Berlin; Ideas City, the New Museum, NTU CCA, Singapore, Nomina Nuda, Los Baños, and GAMeC, Bergamo among others.
Vipash Purichanont
Vipash Purichanont is a curator based in Bangkok. He is a lecturer at the department of Art History at the faculty of Archeology, Silpakorn University. His curatorial projects include ‘Kamin Lertchaiprasert: 31st Century Museum of Contemporary Spirit’ (Chicago, 2011), ‘Tawatchai Puntusawasdi: Superfold’ (Kuala Lumpur, 2019) and ‘Concept Context Contestation: Art and the Collective in Southeast Asia’ (Bangkok, Yogyakarta, Hanoi, Yangon, 2013-2019). He was an assistant curator for the first Thailand Biennale (Krabi, 2018), a curator of Singapore Biennale 2019 (Singapore, 2019), and a co-curator of the second Thailand Biennale (Korat, 2021). He is a co-founder of Waiting You Curator Lab, a curatorial collective based in Chiangmai.
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‘Pollination’ was initiated by The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre in 2018, providing emerging curators and artists in South East Asia the opportunity to co-produce and collaborate, to mutually benefit from this region’s private arts infrastructure – platforms recognizing the value of sharing (pollinating) their critical ideas and activities.
Current members:
Organizations: The Factory Contemporary Arts Centre (Ho Chi MInh City); SAM Fund for Art and Ecology (Jakarta); ILHAM Gallery (Kuala Lumpur); MAIIAM Contemporary Art Museum (Chiang Mai)
Advisors: Zoe Butt, Agung Hujatnikajennong (Bandung), Rahel Joseph (Kuala Lumpur), Vipash Purichanont (Bangkok)
Curators: Grace Samboh (Yogyakarta), Bill Nguyen (Ho Chi Minh City), Khatijah Rahmat (Kuala Lumpur), Le Thuan Uyen (Ho Chi Minh City), LIR (Mira Asriningtyas and Dito Yuwono, Yogyakarta), Kittima Chareeprasit (Chiang Mai)
Artists: Julia Sarisetiati (Jakarta), Vicky Do (Ho Chi Minh City), Izat Arif (Kuala Lumpur); Hoang Minh Duc (Sydney/Hanoi), Maryanto (Yogyakarta), Ruangsak Anuwatwimon (Bangkok)
