km.0

km.0 is an exhibition by Seni Grafis ITB '10, the printmaking division in my faculty, held today (11th January) until the 15th of January at Padi Gallery. I was actually still lolly-gagging in my room when my friend, Pajay, texted me to come to the exhibition. Although it was late, I had to come since I don't know wether I could go on another day and it was also the opening night. So I rushed my self outside, met Pajay, and we walked our way in the night to the exhibition. 'Twas a sight to see all my friends were having so much fun there. And there was even Hasnan, a friend of mine who went to America to study.

All the prints were made for assignments on the previous semester. And may I say I was intrigued by the different feel each artist gave off. I'm proud of my friends for making this exhibition a success. And the finished piece of the Indian drypoint (by my friend Cungek) that I used for my quick sketch is up there being exhibited also. Congrats to Klanting, Cungek, Reuben, Geugeut, Rama, Aming, Afin, Shita, Happy, Moe, Bebek, Hilma, Hajar, Danti, and Tata!

Treasures In My Room

Hello!
It's been a while since I've write here. I see that my last post was that wood cut blunder. Well, that was an interesting thing to remember though. Now I'm happy to say that I've finished the assignment and happy with the results. I made three pictures that I made into woodcut and 5 prints each. But I definitely made more for myself to have.

Currently on my end of year holiday and I pretty much tried getting my life straight again. Had time to do several things that I haven't done in a while. One of them is cleaning. I got to clean my room (and of course, Oni-chan's cage). Books and magazines were full of dust. I kinda felt sorry for them to have someone like me to be their master. I need to read them often. Oh, but besides battling dust, I found an old friend.

Indeed, an old friend. An artifact from the past that contains stories that are near and dear to me.

WoodCUT!

Work in progress. Woodcut. 40x60 cm. 

As you can see, that's my assignment for printing class. I've always been interested towards woodcut artworks, especially the world renowned Japanese woodcut artworks that is Ukio-e. Manual printing has been one of my soft spots. But I chose to pursue the way of the brushes instead. Luckily, there's manual printmaking class for those who're not majoring in it.

For several reasons, I'm currently not in the mood for painting, so I find myself doing woodcuts just to send my mind at ease.

A messy close-up

I don't know what's the story behind this drawing, but I just simply like it. Unlike my painting assignment, this one is actually showing my true self. I just feel content with this one.

But there's this unfortunate event happened while making this.

I started the woodcut last night and continued it the whole day today. But a few moments ago something what I like to call blunderity happened. The woodcut knife plunged itself into my right thumb. YES. It made a huge cut to it.

BLUNDERITY. 

Don't ask me why I actually had time to take a picture of it in midst of my situation. I just did! ;p

Well, as you can see the blood gushed out pretty hard after this. I didn't know what to do except to run around my room panicking. I know, I'm lame. But then I realised I had to wash it first, so I went to the bathroom and did just that. Still the blood wasn't stopping though.

In the end, a friend of mine helped me cover the wound up. And just then I realized what a mess I made to my room from running around panicking. The blood was all over the place. -___-

Even my Moleskine got covered in blood.

Moral of the story:

1. Don't watch TV when you're holding sharp objects. If you lose focus, you're dead.

2. NEVER DO HOMEWORK/ASSIGNMENTS ON SATURDAY NIGHTS! It's a big no no!

3 Weeks

 It's been 3 weeks since I've arrived in Duri. In that three glorious week, what did I do? Nothing. Absolutely nothing in special. Yet.
On the other hand, the immense amount of time that has been graced to me have made me slightly more productive than before. I have actually produced several watercolor works, though not all finished, that are actually quite satisfying. Applause. Thank you.

Several works I did in my vacation.

Basically they're starring at you.

A quickie.

Boys, boys, boys, boys. Boys, I do adore.

And to this day, there's still several new ones also. It feels good to finally be able to make something what I like. But somehow I feel like a slave for my own artwork. Look what it's done to me. It kept me inside my room for 3 whole weeks. Yeah, I need to get a life. But oh well, for now, I'm just gonna look at the positives. A situation like this is hard to come by, get used to it while it lasts.

Swoon's Musical Architecture

One word; amazing!

I Helped!

So back in May, one of my senior asked me to help him on his final project for college. I was asked to make an illustration of a crowd supporting the several people above them doing their activities. And also with several elements from Bandung, since the concept is to reach all of the creative community in Bandung.
I made that a whole week, while juggling with my college assignment and dodging several events that my friends are working on. And I'm really sorry that I didn't give much help.

Well, this is the illustration. I did the pencil and my senior did all the editing. This is supposed to be a billboard design.

I feel so accomplished, since this is pretty much a new challenge for me. The paper an elongated A3 paper, I think. Definitely a challenge. I'm grateful that I've taken it.

Oh, and before this one, I got 3 orders of illustrations from him. It was for the same project also. But those illustrations were made for collectible cards. 

              

 

In Collectible Card Informing (2), my work is the "Sepeda Onthel" illustration, on the top right.

In Collectible Card Informing (3), my works are the portrait of Mick Jagger (first picture) and the Beatles  (third picture).

I can't thank my senior enough, I was happy to have been able to help.

Thanks Kak Soenar!

Hometown + Dark Inspiration

My spacious room in the morning

So after a year away from my hometown, Duri, finally I got the chance to go back and visit it. So far, nothing much has changed. But I do look forward to that non-changing feeling that I used to experience. I can't wait to see the beautiful twilight sky that made me stayed in my room all afternoon. I can't wait to visit my school and the places that I like to go to when with friends. AH! All of them, at least give me one last chance to visit all of them again.

Let's move on to my room first. No, it's not usually this clean. But I like it this way. I like the spacious feeling that it gives. And oh, that's my electric guitar that I vandalized! I wonder if it still works. 

My current workspace. I don't know why the remote have any significance towards the "workspace" concept

This is where I'm gonna spend my days in Duri. Just rolling around this pink carpet and glueing my eyes to my laptop screen, checking on my Twitter, Facebook, and Tumblr for all I care. BUT NO! I don't wanna do that for the whole vacation. Imma find my self something to do. So you better look forward to it! On the side note, I got my Beats back! I can listen to my k-pops privately now (teehee, I secretly like K-pop music... not really). Got a new camera too. I can't wait to get on my bike and take pictures. And something new that I recently got is... -drumroll- a book called Dark Inspiration!

The awesomeness that is Dark Inspiration

Got it at (ak.'sa.ra) bookstore and all I can say is, uh-mazing. These kind of book is hard to stumble upon and I'm pretty lucky to have found one. I like dark artworks and this book has a lot of lovely dark artworks from the artist I know and several ones that are new to me. 

Order from left to right. Top: Kate MacDowell, Audrey Kawasaki. Bottom: Fuco Ueda, Oleg Dou

I'd love to show all the lovely artworks in this book, but I'm just too lazy to take a picture of all of them. Only thing to do now is get your own copy. Don't fuss about the prize, it's definitely worth the money. 

Out of all the artworks in there, Oleg Dou's the one that gave a little bit more impact to me than the others. I don't know why, but I'm quite fond of the faces that he portrays in his artwork. My favorite is Duza's Tears.

Duza's Tears. 2008.

Making of ミルク: An Old, But Interesting Video

It started off with my friend, Sarah (sharkust), tweeted me saying that she Googled "abusedmember" and there's actually a suggestion for the term. Am I really that famous? (nope)
Well, since I had nothing better to do, I just started browsing through the pages, and realised that a lot of it linked back to my old WIP video. I re-watched it. I realized that I need to document my work in progress often. Looking at this video at least helped me gave a little bit of a view towards how much I've progressed. I need to look back to learn for what's to come.

Without further ado, here are the videos:

New Perspective

Salutations internetties! 

Just woke up from a very nice nap and feeling quite refreshed compared to what I felt before. Today was a tiresome day because I had nothing but bread with strawberry jam for breakfast and I had to endure lectures from 8 till 1 o'clock without break. I WAS HUNGRY! And dizzy too. But that doesn't matter because after that my friends, Rossy and Fadel, bought me McDondald's and I got to take a long nap. Oh and also because the lectures gave me a new and interesting insight! I don't regret that I came to campus on a Saturday just for that. I DON'T REGRET ANYTHING! (crazy person)

So today we had this seminar for introducing the studies that my faculty has. There were Interior Design, Fine Arts, Industrial Design, Visual Communication Design (Graphic Design), and Kriya (I don't know what do they call this in English. FAIL!). Each representative from those majors gave lectures about what they do and how studying in arts correlate with their lives. From all of the representative, what caught my eyes were Mr. Albert Yonathan from Fine Arts and Ms. Agnes Tandia from Textile Design (Kriya).  Although I appreciate each and every one of the lectures, I do have to admit I have bigger interest in Visual Arts rather than the other ones. Though, thanks to Mr. Rudy who made me laugh out loud with his lecture while struggling to keep myself from being awake and hungry through out the seminar.

Okay, first thing's first; Mr. Albert Yonathan. He studied ceramic art in ITB and graduated in 2007. Today wasn't the first time I saw him. I think I saw him before in my class being one of our lecturer's assistant. Anyway, when he first came into the room, I was ready to listen. He talked about his visions in his works and his final year assignment; amazing concept. His fondness towards human spirituality is amazing, and it shows in his artworks. 

"Tranquility"
Stoneware glazed, decal, various dimension, 2009

"Dwelling Places"
Glazed middle fire ceramics, decal, wood, 110x19x36.5cm, 2010

I feel so refreshed by the simplicity of the form he took. The way he represents the form of a human being in his work just tickles my sense so much I'm itching to see more what he had made and for his future artworks also.

He also described on how hard it is studying in Fine Arts because aside from practicing your work in dimensional forms, you also have to study theories and histories. Well, I personally am BAD at theories and histories. I didn't even get good marks in highschool for those kinda things. But this is what I want, this is what I like, and I'm gonna fight for it. I just wanna make people smile with what I do. I wanna see those curves in their lips every time they look at what I've made. I've always been and always will, with all that I have and will, want to put a smile on their faces.

His lecture was a slap to my face. Definitely. I had to think, what have I actually done so far to get here? What have I achieved? Have I reached the ultimate pleasure that I've dreamed of now that I'm in a place that thrives with the concept of beauty; the concept of beauty that I'm currently searching for? And still I don't have an answer to that. I'm just going to look around like a blind bat. But also like a blind bat, I'm learning to sense with more than just my eyes.

Oh, besides making ceramic arts, he also make amazing drawings! Again, showing simplicity that represents a whole lot of things.

"Doppelganger-Double Walker"
Gouace and pencil on paper, 57x43cm, 2010

"The Moon"
Pencil and color pencil, 42x29.7cm, 2008

From his lecture I learned that I still have a really long way to go in realizing my full potential in artwork. I'm still a long way to a point where I can say "This is me and no one else can be me!".

Hoping to meet him again in another time and learn more from him. You can also check him out in his blog; white circle. And at the end of the lecture, he gave us one of his favorite quotes:

"Beauty is an ecstasy; it is as simple as hunger. There is really nothing to be said about it. It is like the perfume of a rose: you can smell it and that is all" - W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965)

Okay now on to the second inspiration of the day; Ms. Agnes Tandia, the founder of Kulkith Shoes. She is an alumni of Textile Design in ITB also and graduated last July 2010. What I've found interesting is that she already establish a shoe brand of her own when she was about my age. Now her shoe brand is being sold all over Indonesia and even around the world. In the early days she made her lovely shoes because of one purpose, so that she could stand on her own two feet and continue studying what she likes. Though at first she claimed that she actually wanted to study in Visual Communication Design but she was sent to Kriya instead. Even though Kriya was her last choice in study, with time she came to like  it and enjoy it.

Kulkith Flat Boots - Black

Kulkith Wedges

They made various kinds of shoes I with batik designs on it. I really love the way she uses the material. Again, it's simple but interesting!

She made me realize my urges in art business. lol. 

She was the last lecturer of the day and she put up with our sleepy faces. I salute her for not going all crazy at us. haha. Of course, I salute her also for the struggle in her life.

You can check her works in their online shop, Kulkith Shoes. They can also ship to whenever your country is (I think. teehee)

Or if you somehow happen to be in Jakarta, Indonesia, just visit Geulis @ Level One, Grand Indonesia. 

Well, that's all for now. Imma have my dinner first.

Oh, and shout out to mui amigos, Rossy Apostrophe! The one who bought me today's lunch. You saved my life!