affandi self portrait iii-vanessa singgih pranoto (10657)
TRANSCRIPT
Vanessa Singgih Pranoto
Jeffrey Say
Art Interpretation and Aesthetics
11 November 2010
AFFANDI:
Aesthetic Analysis on “Self-Portrait III” (1975)
Introduction
Affandi is one of the most established painters in
Indonesia’s art scene. He is also known as the father of
Indonesia’s modern painting. With his signature painting
technique, Affandi open the “window” of the world to the
concept of a brand new realism with his state of mind of
expression and intuition. This paper will talk about the
quality of Affandi’s “Self-Portrait III” on aesthetic and
emotion context in comparison with Collingwood’s theory
and other paintings in the same era.
The Emotional or Expressive Qualities Of The Work
Being an artist to Affandi is like a taxi driver. He has to learn how to ‘drive’ well
in order to delight the ‘passenger’. This expressionist painter’s ideology goes on
the same direction of Collingwood’s theory of art as an amusement. On his first
few years of painting, Affandi, a self-taught expressionist painter, exploring his
knowledge of painting by making self-portraits to seek for existence. One of the
well-known works of his is “Self-Portrait III” (1975). Deriving from an
occurrence that happened in Bandung in 1935 that he was banned for entering
an exhibition in Bandung, he keeps wondering what is wrong with his face,
“What’s wrong with my look?”. Nevertheless that curiosity became a turning
point for Affandi to set his firm line of his artistic direction in painting.1 As
written on Ovi Magazine about Collingwood ideology about R.G. Collingwood
1 Jim Supangkat, “Reanalyzing Affandi,” Affandi Volume I 2007.
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Illustration 1“Self-Portrait III” (1975)
AffandiOil on Canvas
Illustration II“Total Eclipse I” (1983). Affandi
Oil on Canvas
theory of arts as Expression and Fantasia, artist, becoming aware that they are in
the grip of an emotion, they give form to it via the work of art they create. 2
“Self-Portrait III” is one of the self-portraits that Affandi made during re-
affirming his artistic attitude until his death. This painting reflected Affandi’s
smiling face assembled with many curve lines and colors. According to Jim
Supangkat on his article about Affandi, the analysis of Affandi’s self-portraits
brought to light why these self-potraits from the “keynote” for this “tune of
expressions” as a whole (2007:64). It explains why Affandi consistently returned
to self-portraits when he felt that he was failing with his painting – it was as if by
doing this, he could fine-tune his emotional tones. This shows how tension
between the social reality, the face, spiritual selfishness, existence, and art
expressions form the basis of Affandi’s work (Ibid.). Therefore, Affandi’s self-
portrait a long the road of his career life can be seen as the essence of his artistic
development.
Achieving the Emotional Qualities
The emotional quality of “Self-Portrait III” can be seen with the line works
and the color that Affandi used. The vigorous curve lines that he made reflected
on emotion state that he feels when he tried to “say” what he saw on the canvas.
Not only in this painting, a lot of Affandi’s painting shown a huge complexion of
emotions as well. His belief of nature force drove him to express the reality into a
phenomenal mind-set. Sun was his depiction of the nature forces that he belief in
on some of his self-portrait, including “Self-Portrait III”.
“I like the sun, so I paint the sun. It is a
symbol of my life. It is like a god. It should be
burning, and hot like the painting. If I only
painted one sun, it is not hot enough, so I paint
another; two suns, three suns or four. It
depends on the sense of heat that I want to
convey.” (Affandi)
2 Emanuel L. Paparella, “R. G. Collingwood's Theory of Art as Expression and Fantasia”, Ovi Magazine. 2010. http://www.ovimagazine.com/art/3838
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Affandi also believe that the best teacher of this belief is also the experience
itself. Owing to the fact that Affandi lived and doing his paintings at Cirebon and
Yogyakarta, Javanese culture took big part of influencing his approach on done
his painting. One of them is wayang kulit or Shadow Puppet. He was enjoying
wayang kulit most of his time. wayang kulit is one of the ancient traditional art
form that can be found in Java, Indonesia. wayang kulit purely inspires his curve
line works on most of his artwork. If we look carefully, wayang kulit rarely use
straight lines.3 By this major influence on his painting style, Affandi manages to
voice the Eastern and Indonesian worldview that strives for stability and balance
between the individual and the universe.4
Tangible Signs of Emotion Quality and How It Affects the Artwork Itself
Art proper is distinguished by a particular and unique emotion, not
possessed by either craft of art as amusement.5 Painting for Affandi was a
process of fixing into colour and form the storm of energy from his emotions
which had arisen through concentrating on something which had initially
inspired him (Wright 1994:112). This inventor of the smear and squeeze
technique often utilized lines and vibrant colors to express what he felt about the
object. According to Astri Wright on Soul, Spirit, and Mountain (1994), Affandi
would spend a long time looking for the painting subjects, and then a long time
studying on the object, probing into its being, until he felt he had become part of
it (112). This statement advocates Wu Shuang statement on how Affandi most of
the time uses his impulse and instinct to paint.6 By using the paint tube and his
hand as the brush itself, the emotion that he felt for the object directly
transmitted to the canvas. Collingwood also mentioned that artists explore
carefully the particularity of their emotion, taking pain to understand it as a
particular specific instance it is. In other words, artists are more interested than
most of us in deciphering their emotions. 7
3 “Affandi Speaks”, 2010. http://www.age.jp/~pranoto/bookenglish/007.htm4 Bambang Asrini Widjanarko, “Affandi: The Never–Ending Legend,” 2007, The Magazine of Garuda Indonesia, May. 2010. http://www.affandiartgallery.com/GarudaM.html5 “Arts Theories and Arts Histories” 2010. 6 Wu Shuang, “Affandi Vs. Van Gogh,” 2007, Wu Shuang, 27th May. 2010. http://boonscafe.com/wushuang/?p=647 Emanuel L. Paparella, “R. G. Collingwood's Theory of Art as Expression and Fantasia”, Ovi Magazine. 2010. http://www.ovimagazine.com/art/3838
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The nature or surrounding who once one of his primary object for expression,
changes how Affandi paint his artwork. Different from his previous self-portraits,
which are more compact in composition, on “Self-Portrait III”, Affandi pictured
himself with a lot of spaced line works to create his face and his expression.
Nearing the 1980s, Affandi’s self-portrait gradually becomes increasingly
transparent, in a way that the painting looks as if Affandi is disappearing in his
struggle with the nature (Samichan, 2007:64). It seems that Nature has change
him from existence seeker to one of the man who want to disappear with nature
in the end. The composition of “Self-Portrait III” is less condensed from the
previous works that are more energetic with fully loaded composition and
colours on the canvas. Affandi seldom leave a single space on his canvas. It could
be shown on his self-portrait from 1966. The mixture of vibrant red, dark brown
and green colour filled the entire canvas with strong expression on the
expression of his face. The curly lines are a little bit arranged to depict his self-
expression.
Affandi’s Emotional State
Affandi admitted that he is a kind of person who hates a straight likeness
to reality.8 That explains why he often paints or draws using a bunch of line
works that is inspired by wayang kulit. This also can be shown on self-portraits
that he did, including “Self-Portrait III” (1975). For him, the most important thing
of the drawing is the subject itself. Affandi believe in his intuition. With this
intuition, he sorted out the reality surrounding him to find “aesthetic objects”
which then became the basis for his expressions.9 In a process that certainly he
himself was not aware of, his perceptions in reality entered the realm of
sensitivity. Affandi always wants to know and get into his object of painting and
become one with it. He will loss himself and then there were a feeling as if he will
going to fight against something. Fight against the reality that is what he means.
Along the journey of his artist life, he always came with this undeniably art
works that are out of the box, out of the usual interpretation. His depiction of his
8 “Affandi Speaks”, 2010. http://www.age.jp/~pranoto/bookenglish/007.htm9 Jim Supangkat, “Reanalyzing Affandi,” Affandi Volume I 2007.
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surrounding is highly influenced by wayang kulit. Affandi once mentioned that he
wants to capture the sign that natural force shown in his painting, that is why he
always feel that he have not done nothing great on creating an artwork. He has
not capture anything yet, that is why he feels that he has to learn a lot more.
Conclusion
In my own interpretation, Affandi’s “Self-Portrait III” (1975) has a quite
loose energy on it if comparing to his previous artwork. I feel that he on a
difficult situation but what he tries to always do is smile. By painting, he feels
very happy and there are just only him, God, and the object. Affandi, to me, is
considered as a total expressionist artist rather than modern artist. It is true that
he started the modern movement of painting in Indonesia, but I can feel a lot
more emotions and expressions on his complex way to draw using curve line.
There are some rhythmic inside the lines that he created on his “Self-Portrait”
(1975).
To Conclude, Affandi on his way of finding the true direction of his work
did not perceived the reality as the real one, as a naturalist but his art is beyond
real. Hence, the depiction of reality in his painting find shape without having
been planned before, along with the R.G. Collingwood’s theory about artist and
craft man. An artist does not plan on what he or she want to make, and that is
what Affandi done to expressed his feeling of the object that he paint.
Illustrations Cited
Affandi. Self-Portrait III. 1975. Affandi Art Gallery, Indonesia. Affandi. Vol. 1.
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Jakarta: Bina Lestari Budaya Foundation, 2007. 121. Print.
Affandi. Total Eclipse I. 1983. Affandi Art Gallery, Indonesia. Affandi. Vol. 1.
Jakarta: Bina Lestari Budaya Foundation, 2007. 65. Print.
Works Cited
"Affandi Speaks." Interview. Affandi Speaks. Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
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<http://www.age.jp/~pranoto/bookenglish/007.htm>.
Kemp, Gary. "Collingwood's Aesthetics (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)."
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 2009. Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
<http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/collingwood-aesthetics/#ArtAmu>.
Paparella, Emanuel L. "Ovi Magazine : R.G. Collingwood's Theory of Art as
Expression and Fantasia by Emanuel L. Paparella." Ovi Magazine. 29 Dec.
2008. Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
Shuang, Wu. "Wu Shuang » Affandi vs. Van Gogh." | Art in Singapore Reviewed.
Wu Shuang, 28 May 2007. Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
<http://boonscafe.com/wushuang/?p=64>.
Supangkat, Jim, and Sardjana Sumichan. Affandi. Vol. 1. Jakarta: Bina Lestari
Budaya Foundation, 2007. Print.
Widjanarko, Bambang Asrini.
"The Magazine Of Garuda Indonesia." Affandi ArtGallery ::: Exclusive
Dealer of Affandi's Graphic Art. Affandi Art Gallery, 2007. Web. 11 Nov.
2010. <http://www.affandiartgallery.com/GarudaM.html>.
Wright, Astri. Soul, Spirit, and Mountain: Preoccupations of Contemporary
Indonesian Painters. Kuala Lumpur: Oxford UP, 1994. Print.
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