Information from internet and SOVA 123, and brenda’s notes. (Mainly from sova 123, posted here for easy reading)

Background
Son of poor Czech immigrants
Commercial artist in the 1950s, very successful. (once the most famous footwear illustrator in new york)

* 1960s:
- Worked towards goal of machine-like art, devoid of emotional and social comment in a New York Studio, known as “The Factory”.
- Work ranged from portraits of friends, celebrities to news events,car crashes, electric chairs to consumer products.

Abandoned comic-strip painting.

- Based work on commercial & popular images.
~ Took subject matter from the category of mass communication — newspaper, comic strips, ads, images of mass-produced products, etc.
~ One crucial quality of Warhol’s images = extreme obviousness.
~ Famous brands: Campbell’s Soup, Coca Cola; Famous people: Elvis, Marilyn; Most familiar objects: dollar bills, newspapers.

- Settled on a ‘cold’, ‘no-comment’ style of painting.
- Presented images as if they have undergone little or no processing by the artist.  Instead he favored the print method & use of assistants.
~ Implied that art could be made by anybody or as a collaborative venture along lines of commercial mass production.
~ Also encouraged the idea that anybody should be able to produce art.
-  Focused not on the end result/the ‘original work of art’, but on the creative processes that produced the work of art.

* 1962:
- Painted a series of DIY paintings.
- Such works mimicked the popular pastime of painting by numbers.
- Each canvas was based on a diagram from a ‘paint-by-numbers’ kit, photographed and projected onto the canvas; the numbers identifying the different coloured areas were produced in a mechanical way — commercial transfers.

1962: Discovered replicating image through photo-mechanical process — silkscreen printing.

E.g. Dollar Bills
~ Hand drawn banknote as basic unit to be printed one by one on a strict grid system.
* Grid = A pure expression of serial repetition that do away with relational methods of composition — it functioned as a sign for modernism in the context of abstract & representational painting.
~ In Dollar Bills, Warhol was literally printing money, matching technique to subject.  He also drew attention to the status of art as a mere commodity — ‘money on walls’.  The buying & selling of contemporary art was becoming big business in NY.

Silkscreen printing technique also eliminated the distinguishing personality of brushwork & satisfy his desire to make himself into a machine

* Mechanical method combined with the banality of images was to make his paintings appear completely meaningless & this was reinforced by his practice of repeating his images.
* Repetition = A useful tactic to empty his mind, free him to respond intuitively & it is open to accidents & chance effects.

- The accidental effects are often deliberately sought by Warhol.  In his hands, the silk-screen becomes a highly flexible means of creating expressive paint surfaces & forms.;  He exercised more control over the production of his work than is generally supposed.  The arrangement of images & the determining of the relationship of the image or block of images to the round are conscious compositional procedures.

1962 -3, Warhol was producing some of the most influential art..
~ In them, traditional assumptions about the uniqueness & expressive potential of art was questioned in a disturbing way in his use of repetition & semi-mechanical method.

~ There was also an identification with consumerism & assembly-line methods of production.  This suggested an ironing out of personality & individual identity which was an American condition.  Warhol recognised that assembly-line production while dehumanizing was also imbued with grandeur & inspiring efficiency

* Use of the photo-screen
- An easy to use technique; capable of indefinite reproduction & is attractive because of its mechanical nature.
- This technique was used in the prints of film stars (e.g. Marilyn, Elvis, etc.)
~ Warhol used images selected from the collection of publicity shot he had collected.  The images were not arbitrary images of famous people but emblems of their beauty, glamour & star quality that they & the film studios had chosen to represent to the public.

Warhol was aware that over-exposure to images gradually divest them of any emotion & gave them iconic power by engraving them in our memory through force of repetition.

Warhol’s work:
-Meaning:
Revealed constant & significant preoccupations with fame, glamour, death, violence & disaster & with money.
- Formal/aesthetic significance:
Repetition reduced images to elements in the composition & attention is directed towards a consideration of what the artist has done to it.

* Implications of Warhol’s work:
- Addressed a culture that overflowed with information, a society where people experienced most things at 2nd or 3rd hand through print & TV, through images that become banal (ordinary) and disassociated by repetition, there is a place for affectless art.
- ‘Dead-pan’ style of Warhol of the 1960s recalled Dada & anticipated Conceptual Art.

- Link between the world of consumer products & high art.

- Warhol’s images call into question the uses to which we put all of our images.

- Rendered clearly the impact of the mundane so that his paintings stand apart from everyday life & illuminate it.

- Put fine-arts format at the service of his media-style flair.

My own reflection (By Victor Gan)

The reason why warhol is acclaimed to be one of the most influential artist of the 20th century is the fact that his art depicts accurately the american society at that time as closely as possible. The  propagation of mass consumerism, advent of televison and computers (haha), meant that the society is exactly what warhol is making it out to be. Banal (ordinary images), are being repeated again and again until they become iconic stay in the viewers mind. Iconic images are being repeated again and again until they become banal and not so special and iconic anymore. The fact that he is producing his art at a pace as fast as factory meant that he views art as a product, just like how everything in our world are products, affected greatly by money.

I suddenly know why he is famous and people like him. Because he is able to see society as it is and identify the trend. Yet, he did not give his views and comments on those trends. its like him saying :”oh chiakai is gay, but hey i didnt say its wrong!” (Neither did he say it is right). He brought attention to the issue, and leave it up to his viewers to interpret.

Any comments on warhol?

Bayu Utomo Radjikin

• Malaysian sculptor and painter
• Founder of the Matahati – group of artists inspired by artist-critic Wong Hoy Cheong
• Javanese/Indonesian roots
• Post colonial influence – but instead of resolving Asian roots with Western influences (like most artists of his time), he encapsulates the emasculation of the human condition with the loss of culture

Central beliefs/ideologies

• Rebellion against the Malaysian traditional derision of the human form in art – was almost always figurative in sculpture
  • Religious links – the Islamic world prohibits the portrayal of the human form in art
• Expressive, figurative sculptures evoke emotion and shock, often stimulating debate – though Radjikin demands no fixed interpretation
• Often attacks and reenacts the horror of the human and social condition, e.g. of the lone abused child, the wounded soldier, innocent bystander

Lang Kacang

• Sculpture of a armless tribal warrior screaming into the void
• Expression on face is contorted by his roar of frustration and anger
• Artist’s self portrait?
• Vibrant, fierce, thought provoking
• Warrior is the symbol of the spirit who becomes a source of protection and support throughout his life’s journey – caught in the midst of confusion and seeking direction
• Describes the emasculation of the modern man — soulless and empty within
• Displacement of tradition and culture by western modernity – the warrior appears alienated from his time and is helpless to his situation; the armless warrior is useless – hinting on the impracticality of culture and tradition beside the rise of modernity; appearing as something weakened, useless, unable to fight back
• However, elaborate headdress symbolizes rich culture and tradition — upwards tilt of the head suggests a sense of defiance and pride and resolve

–jiaying

PS JIA YOU EVERYONE!

http://dede-eri-supria.com/arts/1980-2001/Welcome-Am-I-an-Actor-of-the-Balinese-Opera-or-a-Mere-Servant-of-Tourism.html

Welcome! Am I an Actor of the Balinese Opera, or a Mere Servant of Tourism?
2001
80 cm x 70 cm

Dede Eri Supria

Analysis (By me, so not neccessary the best, just a point of view)

A social commentary by Dede eri Supria on the clash between the culture in Bali and the packaging of it as a tourist attraction. Bali is a fast growing tourists hotspot where tourists expects to get a glimpse of Asian culture. In this painting, Dede raised the example of balinese opera, an artform prevalent in Bali. From the title of the work,it shows a diminishing status of the art form in Bali as the modernism and globalisation caused the art form to be presented as a money attracting product used to boost the country’s economic wealth but not its culture wealth.Additionally, through the usage of Dede’s hyper realism techniques, the painting depicts an actor that looks real but yet not alive, capturing the physical and omitting the spiritual value of the actor.

The actor is being superimposed on a a background that lacks orderliness to show how the Balinese Opera had been affected by urbanisation. Wooden crates and sticks are all used item from constructions. These items have clogged up the stage and the artist seemed to be out of place. This messiness and chaos in the surrounding creates a contrast and tension with the intricate design of the actor’s costume. It shows how the art form had actually been ruined by acts of modernisation and all that remains are superficial and incomplete. Yet the tourists who paid money to “experience” the culture are unaware that what they are experiencin are not the true essence of the art form.

The actors’ intense yet at the same time empty expression on his face shows how the actor is merely a puppet or tool of tourism. When one mention opera or acting, the expression and emotion of the actors shows the spirit of the performance. A good actor is defined by one who is able to use his expression to convey his emotions. In the painting, the actor is staring into blank space, wrinkling his eyebrow, yet one can feel the emptiness in his eyes. His eyeballs transfixed on the object seemed to lack spirit. Through his eyes, one can see no plot, no character, no emotion. He is as if an empty shell. There are nothing within him, just as the balinese opera has nothing within it as an artform as it is being furiously packaged and presented to the world.

There are frames around the actor’s neck and a stick that seemed to go throw the actors head, showing how modernism is controlling and stiffling the expression of the actors. Actors on stage are akin to artists in a studio. They create their art according to what they feel and want to convey. In this painitng, it shows otherwise. The actor has a frame around his neck. This symbolises the stiffled creativity and input that the actor has on his own show. He is more likely to act out a plot that has proven popular with the tourists than to be able to act out a plot that is less popular but is more to his liking.  The stick that goes through the actors head symoblises that acts of urbanisation had invaded and affected his mind and way of thinking. Maybe the actor is not even affected by the stiffling on expression, but has otten used to it.

The robbing of expression, creativity, emotions leads Dede eri supria to raise the question for the actors of Bali opera. Are they still actors that they once were, or are they just merely a tool to earn money. Under the pressure of the rapid changing society, every artform have to evolve and keep up with time. In the case of Bali Opera, Dede eri supria is questioning if it is truly evolving or is it slowly losing its battle with modernisation and losing its essence.

Can be compared with

Dancing in the midst of Flower
2001
70 cm x 80 cm’

Barong Express
2001
70 cm x 80 cm

Anyone keen to come up with a comparison analysis?

Born in Jakarta, January 29, 1956.

Studied with Dukut Hendratnoto (well known social realist painter of the seventies) for two years
Studied at SSRI Yogya (1974-1978) (didn’t finish)
He chose to study autodidact and live as a professional painter.
Work offers critics about the poor in big cities social circle.
came from a simple family that lived in the capital city, has a strong motive for expressing matters related to the survival of common people in big cities
Pioneer of Gerakan Seni Rupa Indonesia in the late 70’s.
received some awards: General Award for The Arts from The Society For American Indonesia Friendship Inc. (1978), The International Visitor’s Program from USIS, USA (1981), Anugerah Adam Malik (1986), and Affandi Award (1993).

Style
- Being Fascinated by photographic realism
- Developed his paintings through collection of photographs
- Found his idioms through observing these photos
- Goes beyond photography
The sceneries he creates in his canvases are impossible for photography to emulate. In playing with this imagination of the unreal-reality or engineered visual reality, he employs painstakingly realistic techniques in the details of his works.

Subject Matter
Urban Dilemmas- Struggle of working social groups and heir hardlives as a consequence of urbanization
Lost Condition of symple people in the labyrinth of urban society who are trapped by rapid and complicated chages
Developed an idiom in the form of perspective, creating the illusion of vast space including labyrinth, urban landscape, skyscraper, etc.
Horrible landscapes of a big city dominated by advertisement images, through painting them in several different perspectives
Ideas, dramatization and personal experience are important elements

next up: work analysis of dede’s works (hopefully others can contribute their own input!)