Discussing Taboo through Art Workshop

Ika (dressed in black and with glasses) while attending Footscray Community Art Center, Melbourne, Australia in 2015 (Personal Document)

Workshops are my favourite empowering place. Since my first exhibition, conducting workshops has been one of the activities I do as a part of said exhibition. As a self-taught artist, I like workshops because they provide me with the room to meet and share my work to the public while making work at the same time. I want to show that just because we are in an environment that only motivates us to be buyers, that does not mean we do not have the ability to create.



I was invited to be one of the artists in WANITA (Woman’s Art Network INA to AUS) project: Female Artivism Jakarta at Footscray Community Art Centre, Melbourne, Australia in 2015. The workshop is one of the activities we made as part of the event, in addition to exhibition and FGD (Focus Group Discussion). I gave this workshop the title of Kata Untuk Perempuan (Word for Women), inspired by some people’s questions on the name of the project. Why wanita? Why not perempuan?”
 


A question that made me realize about so many words out there to describe women. Women themselves may have different feelings for these different words. The first workshop was attended by 20 people from various background, age, sexual orientation, and citizenship. In fact, this diversity made the workshop full of rich perspectives and stories. From choices of words to stories behind them. This response was important in providing an overview of how language represents women in their daily lives in many countries.



This first workshop in Australia became the origin for Kata Untuk Perempuan project, which I established in Indonesia since December 2015. This product documented words used to describe women in our daily lives here in Indonesia through collage, because I realized we have so many words in Bahasa Indonesia to describe women, including in local languages.



As an artist who uses collage as the main medium, I think choosing this technique is appropriate. I feel not many people are familiar with collage, compared to painting, picture, sculpted statue, and theatre. In fact, collage is a simple technique to create artwork, with simple tools and materials. This provides confidence to people who have never made art to follow and learn to make art using this technique.



Within a year of running this project, from December 2015 to 2016, I managed to gather more than 300 workers from 30 collage workshops in 5 cities in Indonesia. 



Speaking the unspeakable 
 



What did I find during my year of running Kata Untuk Perempuan project? I found the general representation of women in our daily languages in Indonesia. As it turned out, the public can be very honest and open to discuss their reasons for choosing a word, even if these reasons may be very personal and intimate.



I feel maybe it is because the answer I searched for did not need to be given explicitly. Through collage, there is convenience and security from disrupting feelings, without the risk of providing a direct explanation that may sound weird, silly, and other distasteful feelings. By making work with our own hands, the offer to state opinions through the collage medium becomes a fun process, not only for me but also for participants.



I started to receive offers and invitations to make collage workshops from specific organisations or communities. The objective is to discuss various sensitive topics for different audiences. Starting from human rights for youth, corruption, female house workers, gender-based violence for victims and survivors, to HIV/AIDS for groups considered vulnerable as victims and patients.



Some of the workshop results were exhibited. Their work provided an overview and conveyed a message to the public on topics we often cannot talk about publicly. Not only because of how difficult it is to access such topics, but also the risk of being judged, which often occurs to victims or people experiencing the things covered by the topic.



In one workshop, for example, communication and information exchange, including stories on a topic, has occurred since I met face to face with participants for the first time, and among participants themselves. After the work is completed and exhibited or uploaded to social media, discussions kept on rolling.



This is a communication flow that may never happen if we did not meet in a workshop. It means that in each workshop, we try to create a creative, open, and safe space for people to express their opinion in a free and honest way. Space that is getting harder to find in daily lives, which is full of provocations and hoaxes, both in the real and cyber world.



Art workshop becomes a solution to create discussion and equal, inclusive, and creative expression spaces for everyone to talk about many things in life, including for things that are considered taboo. Because learning and sharing will always be the right beginning to create a change in society, both in small and large scale. The workshop is no longer an activity that may and can be done by certain groups, but it can be conducted by everyone.



In an art workshop, I want everyone to learn to articulate their individual opinions through new ways. Looking at a problem beyond self-perspective. Listening to other people’s opinion patiently, and not easily making assumptions. Realizing that our feelings and thoughts are as important as other people’s.



The ability to create artwork with our own hands is an acquired skill anyone can learn. Despite that, in the end, not everyone can and wants to be an artist. Having said that, art will always become and give, as well as create something other media may not be able to.



Ika Vantiani becomes the idea trigger for submitting IDF Proposal 2019 in the category of Art and Cultural Performance.



Have ideas for Arts and Culture in Indonesia? Please write your response in the comment section or send us your ideas using blog/article, vlog, or infographic format through IDF Proposal Submission 2019. The ideas will be published on IDF’s website, and some will be selected to be presented at the Idea and Innovation Market.

The selected comment and most popular idea will receive a souvenir from Du’anyam. Send your ideas now