BT1 Essay

Lucia Hartini has explored dreams and imagination as she sought to discover herself through her works. Why did she create dream-like imagery and do you think she has been effective in using dreams as part of her works?

Lucia Hartini often created dreamlike images in her works to represent her inner mental state and also it is a representational of the environment she is in. Hartini used dreams, imaginations and representations in her painting to comment on both her personal experiences and the society as she is unable to comment on these issues directly. It is due to the fact that it is illegal in the society of Indonesia, and also because of the fact that she is a woman, hence she do not have the right to openly express her inner emotions. In her society, women are not suppose to show how they feel and they must always appear to be graceful and calm. Hence, she can only express the issues and her inner emotions through her dreams, where her dreams are represented on the painting.

Also, by creating a dream-like world in her paintings, it is one of the best way o expess her emotions and feelings. It allows

her to express it in a surreal way, by irrationally combining unrelated objects together. By painting these, she allows the audience to see for themselves what she normally dreams and from there, they can then better relate to the artist

In "Sri Kandi", she created the work by arranging herself staring into numerous little eyes with no logic. Through the arrangement, the audience can then interpret that the eyes many symbolize the criticism of the society and that she is no longer afraid or boarded by them as she stares directly back into the small eyes, showing her courage and confidence.

She has indeed effectively combined their dreams into her works. As she painted each of her painting with great details, the works then seem to be really depicting the images in dreams. Due to her super surrealism style, where all objects are painted very realistically. The audience then seem to be able to relate easily to the paintings and go into Hartini's drams and feel the emotions that the artist is feeling. As when the audiences get to observe, feel and travel inside the artist's dreams, then audience will then be able to see the world from her perspective. In this way Hartini will be able effectively portray her current state of mind and views on the society to her audience.

It is evident in her works, like "Imagination XII" that although the work is very surreal, depicting cooking pans exploding in front of cosmic landscapes, the audience get to see the artist's dream and then understand what she is trying to portray. In this case, she is trying to portray Indonesia women's daily lives, and with all the explosions and intensity, the audience then know that the artist view the jobs of the women to be very hard, intensive and tiring. However, Indonesia women still need to maintain calmness on the outside, suggested by the calming landscapes of the background.

Overall, through adopting a surrealistic stule, she is able to express her inner feelings towards both the society and herself, without going against Indonesia society's protocol of women not being expressing their views and feelings. Also, she allows the viewers to have a tour in her dreams to allow them to understand and feel her emotions and views on the society more thoroughly. Thus, she achieved her goals of having her artworks to relate to the people through the style of super surrealism.

Scott Wade's Dirty Car Art

These artworks are done by artist Scott Wade in a very creative way. The artist has make the dirty car the canvas for his artwork. The dust has then became the paint that he used to apply onto the 'canvas'. He has also cleverly managed to create the gradient of the 'painting' with the amount of dust wiped away from the windows of the car. The darker regions will be the regions that are cleared and hence showing the black colour of the window pan, the white regions will created by the colours of the dust.

The artist has cleverly used the grayscale created to depict many famous paintings such as the 'mona lisa' and 'the starry starry night' and also the realistic landscapes too (as shown above).

The artist has really showed the public that dust art is no worse that any other kinds of art medium. He showed us that if people put in effort in creating art, any thing can be turned into a beautiful piece of artwork.

This artist and the way he creates art really shows us that art can be created and expressed in different ways. The dirt on the car which was once so priceless and considered as waste has now become the new medium for art. This genre of art is a very good example. A dirty car has now became a new of valuable art. This shows that art works are all around us and everyone can create art if we have the eyes to look around and the creative mind to produce interesting and original pieces of artworks.

Art do not need to be always done in the style of oil or water paintings, new mediums of art could be explored too. In the modern society, the concept of art has changed tremendously. In the past, art has been considered a way to depict history and only a few ways of creating art were accepted. However, in the modern society, people are coming up with new ways to create art, ways that constantly surprise the public. The concept of art has changed to a way that if someone is able to appreciate the work and do acknowledge it to be a piece of artwork, there it will be considered as art.

There is, however, a down side to this new art medium. It is the fact that the artwork cannot sustain for a long period of time. As time passes, due to wind, rain and other environmental factors, the dust on the car may be washed or blown off and the artwork may be ruined in a short period of time. There are also many other mediums of art that cannot be sustained for a long period of time too. This process is unavoidable. For example, sand art and art that are made from the nature, like works of Andy Goldsworthy. I guess that sometimes when we are creating artworks, we cannot expect that our artworks will maintain in its original form forever. We need to accept the fact that one day, our artwork will be destroyed. Hence, as artists, we need to learn to let go and constantly creating new and better works.

This unique way of creating artworks has certainly opened a new approach to art. Now, people can then become even more daring and innovative when it comes to creating art pieces.

Under water Sculpture Park

Chanced upon an artwork created beneath in the sea. This is an underwater sculpture gallery in Grenada created by global artist Jason deCaries Tayor. This artwork shows the various daily activities that are experienced by people. It explores a new idea that humans can actually survive underwater, a new environment. This is a rather interesting art work as it is designed to be exhibited in the sea. This is a very new concept as normally artworks are usually exhibited in museum, however the artist chose to put in on the sea bed, where regular people will not have the chance to visit. These sculptures are built on top of artificial reefs as often the natural sea bed is too soft to withstand the sculptures.

I feel that these artworks are very dependent on the environment around them. As seen from the 2 pictures below, within half of a year, the sculpture will be covered with organisms of the water. The water environment around it is actually part of the artwork too. So the artwork does not only involve the sculptures, but it is also the changes that will be observed on the sculptures over a period of time. The response of the environment on the sculptures is an important element of the artwork. The artwork engages the process of change through a period of time. The work conveys a strong message about ecological changes and atmospheres of the nature. It tells us that we should live in harmony with the environment as only by doing so, we lives, like the artwork, can then be more complete.



I feel that the artist may be trying to convey the message of the over development in the current society. As when we use up all the resources and after polluting our entire environment, we may only have the choice of living underseas to survive. Hence, this artwork actually talks about the serious environmental issues of today. We will then have to carry out our daily activities like cycling and reading (as seen from the pictures above) under the sea. By allowing the organisms, such as corals, to grow on the sculptures themselves suggest that the human and the nature are interdependent and we are actually a part of nature. This further more highlights the issue of environmental protection.

By having artworks in the marine environment, it also allows the nature environment to interact with artworks there. By seeing the artworks beneath the water, it also gives it a mysterious sense and the audiences themselves can interact with nature at the very moment when they are viewing the works. It also provides a chance to the public to come in contact with nature (water in this case) and it will allow its theme to be better conveyed to them.

This form of artwork can be said to be revolutionary as it opens a new space to which art can be exhibited. It provides a brand new environment for the public to view and appreciate art. People will be able to view and appreciate art from a new perspective. Art is universal and it can be appreciated in anywhere and from any perspective, and even from under the water.

This work also tells us that for any kind of artworks, the environment and surroundings play a important role in helping the audiences to perceive the piece of work. Hence, artist should always incorporate their artworks to the most suitable environment so as to better convey the works' messages and themes to the audience.