Global Art and the Museum

Founded in 1988 by artists Nindityo Adipurnomo (Indonesia, 1961) and Mella Jaarsma (the Netherlands, 1960), the Cemeti Art House presents more than ten projects a year, ranging from site specific, community based exhibitions to performances involving local and foreign artists, writers and curators. Since its outset as Cemety Gallery, Cemeti Art House has been actively promoting and stimulating practices in the contemporary Indonesian art scene and on a wider international platform, establishing, among others, important partnerships with Australian and Dutch institutions.

Adipurnomo, whose work as an artist questions cultural systems’ mechanism and encourages participation, looks at Indonesian contemporary art “as a form of concern and reflection of artists’ views related to issues on a developing society. Through their work, artists honestly respond and often criticize very specific social phenomena while bringing an aesthetic perspective to the discussion. Being bond and stuck to particular media disciplines becomes a less crucial issue.” (Adipurnomo, Cemeti Art House 2011)

Eko Nugroho in collaboration with Ki Catur Kuncoro, Ign. Sugiharto a.k.a Pak Cling, Yenu Ariendra, Andi Seno Aji, and Jonet Suriatmoko, Contemporary Wayang Performance (detail), “Hidden Violence”, 2009, Courtesy Cemeti Art House

The Building

The Cemeti Art House exhibition space, designed by architect Eko Agus Prawoto in 1999, reflects the paradoxes between local-global, traditional-modern, individual-collective, crafted-industrial, conventional-innovative and is conceived as an open studio suited for workshops, discussions, and learning. The Cemeti Art House and its studio aim to function as a place for research and exchange where curators, writers, art critics and artists meet each other in one of the several residency programmes.

Interior view of Cemeti Art House, Terra Bairaghosa, “Power to the Pixel (And to the Artisan)”, 2009, Courtesy Cemeti Art House

Residency Programs

Cemeti Art House offers residencies for artists, curators and multidisciplinary researchers.

Curator/Writer/Art Critics Residency

From 2011 up to 2013, Cemeti Art House offers two residencies each year for curator, writer, or art critic from Indonesia as well as from abroad.

HotWave

This residency program involves three artists from three different countries, Indonesia, the Netherlands, and Australia, during the period of three months. Cemeti Art House’s HotWave program intends to focus on the importance of art practice with an emphasis on the art processes and social, innovative experiences.

Dutch Artists

In collaboration with Heden – The Hague, Cemeti Art House brings directly Dutch artists in two periods of residency every year, one artist in each period.

Indonesian Artists

Two Indonesian artists can take part in HotWave residency program a year, divided in two periods on residency. Indonesian artists in HotWave Residency Program are fully supported by Heden – The Hague, The Netherlands Embassy in Jakarta, and Hivos – Jakarta.

Australian Artists

In collaboration with Asialink – Australia, Cemeti Art House brings directly one Australian artist each year in one period of HotWave residency

Other Countries

Cemeti Art House offers opportunity for other artists (preferably from Asia) to take part in one period of HotWave residency each year (for months April to June). Artist must fund their expenditure for there is no financial support available.

HoteWave #1, Lotte Geeven, “1 a.m., microscope sky”, 2010, Courtesy Cemeti Art House

Independent Residency Programs

Cemeti Art House offers opportunity for artist/researcher to undertake independent residency. Exploration of space, working technique and collaboration with other art agents are supported to escalate the capacity of artist and researcher. In order to give more opportunity to multidisciplinary researchers, in 2011 Cemeti Art House host an independent residency of Mada van Gaans (fashion designer, the Netherlands) and Harmen van de Wal (architect, the Netherlands) from 15 January to 31 March. This residency program is supported by Fonds BKVB, the Netherlands, and becoming a way to encourage multidisciplinary researchers who want to conduct independent residency.

Landing Soon 2006 – 2009

Landing soon was a three year exchange programme organised by Heden, The Hague the Netherlands and Cemeti Art House, Yogyakarta, Indonesia. This project is supported by Heden, The Hague, the Netherlands and the Culture & Development Programme of the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Jakarta. During a residency period of three months, Dutch artists as well as Indonesian artists are ‘landing’ in Yogyakarta. In_ Landing Soon_, the local, as well as the global, are researched through different themes, visions and conditions.

Landing Soon #10: AUDIBLESOUND by Cilia Erens

Cilia Erens’s sound art is the result of filtering, conceptual selection of recordings of the reality of civilization and daily human life, reverberating a hundred kinds of call to prayer and the roaring of thousands of motorized vehicles.

Cilia Erens (Dutch), “Soundspace Yogya”, 2009, Courtesy Cemeti Art House

Special Projects:

Biennale Jogja X

Cemeti Art House was institutionally participating in Biennale Jogja X 2009. This Biennale’s edition Jogja Jamming highlighted historical documents on the visual art tradition in Yogyakarta over the last 50 years. Cemeti Art House curated the small presentation Contemporary Art Scene among us, giving back the trust to ‘Art Practice’ and ‘Art and Society’ within a reflection on historical reading.

Little Architects from East Sukaraja

Little Architects from East Sukaraja is a public program designed by Nindityo Adipurnomo and Mella Jaarsma for the village children of East Sukaraja, Majalengka, West Java. ‘Building a Home’ became the main theme for this program, whilst also serving as a bridging tool for the children of farming and tile industry workers of the sub-urban Jatiwangi community.

Workshop Superindo Sculpture Park led by Tim Woodward, 2010, Courtesy Cemeti Art House

+ROAD

+ROAD is a collaborative project between New Zero Art Space, Yangon, Myanmar and Cemeti Art House, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, involving five young artists from Yogyakarta and five artists from Yangon.

Traditional Art and Culture Program

In collaboration with ten Non-Government Organizations from Yogyakarta supported by the Ford Foundation, the Cemeti Art House created a post earth quake relief program for five villages. This program—which included workshops, carnivals and performances—that was held from May 2007 till May 2008, was meant to re-vivid the performances and related visual arts in the traumatized areas.

Eko Nugroho in collaboration with Ki Catur Kuncoro, Ign. Sugiharto a.k.a Pak Cling, Yenu Ariendra, Andi Seno Aji, and Jonet Suriatmoko, Contemporary Wayang Performance (view), “Hidden Violence”, 2009, Courtesy Cemeti Art House

Indonesian Visual Art Archive

Institute based in Yogyakarta. It was established in 1997 initially under the name of Yayasan Seni Cemeti (until April 2007). Our main area of work is in documentation, research, library and organizing visual art education and exploration programs. IVAA also functions as a think tank or a creative laboratory to discuss various concepts and activities that support the development of visual art and contemporary culture in both practice and discourse. IVAA’s documentation collection includes photographs and audio-video recordings of artists at work processes and visual art events as well as donations in the form of reference materials of various kinds starting with visual arts and culture reference books, national and international exhibition catalogues, visual artists portfolio’s through to audio visual/video art works. IVAA’s database contains thousands of data references and archives related to Indonesian and international visual arts, which have been collected for more than 10 years. All of this data is stored at the IVAA library in Patehan Tengah 37 in Yogya. This library has also become an information, reference and learning facility for visual artists, researchers, university students, curators, critics and various other parties from the fine arts infrastructure. This library is also the only independent public library specializing in visual arts in Indonesia. Since the middle of 2008, IVAA has digitalized archives and developed partnerships with various fine art institutes in Indonesia in order to preserve the visual arts archives and to put this database onto an online network at ivaa-online.org. This is part of the developments at IVAA Digital Information Center. As a development from this documentation and archives work, IVAA has also initiated activities that are related to developing visual art and culture, such as the writing program (Aksara Creative Art Writers Club), artist’s discussions, workshops, exhibitions, art’s projects, seminars and so on.