Guntur’s works are simple: images of his friends, drawn and painted, realistically. The difference, if there is any, is that the canvases are quite big compared to drawings on paper. As a medium, Guntur uses graphite pencil. However, using a simple technique and subject matter, Guntur’s works appearance is far from simple. Most people who see them are mostly awed by the presented visual display. The feeling is usually felt as they come to realize that the images of faces are done in a very simple technique, merely using a black pencil. We can safely assume that the amazement is felt because these pictures resemble the images of photography so much. We can also safely assume that these images aren’t done directly referring to models, but referring to the photographs of these models. We cannot be sure that such a detailed and sharp appearance of face is done by Guntur by looking directly to the model. Beside, we can understand that these pictures took too long a time to be made that the no model can sit that long to be observed by Guntur in all of the aspect of his face, even the pores!

Talking about Guntur’s works inescapably lead us to the discourse of the realist painting, which currently related to photography. We cannot deny that most artists who deal with the technique and language of realist currently use photography as helping tools – in addition to other helping tools, such as projector. Pluralism, which comes to take role as the foundation for contemporary art, has given realist tendency a chance to resurface. The contemporary art, which shows the return of art as representational area, cannot deny the realist tendency the glory it deserves. One of the instances where the realist tendency is shown is on photographic works. Photography is a medium that often gets to be called transparent, directly referring to the subject matter, narration and issues that it represents. In this matter, photography can even be called the most realist medium, just like the American theoretician, Terry Barret, said.

“The theory of Realism raises questions for contemporary aestheticians about the nature of Realism itself: What do we mean when we call a work of art Realistic? Photographs and other camera-based images are commonly accepted as the most Realistic of the arts. [i]

William Henry Fox Talbot, the England inventor of photography process, once said that photography is the pencil of nature. “The camera, in Talbot’s view, allows nature directly to inscribe an images onto paper without an interfering and fallible of a human artist.”[ii] I want to rephrase that statement by saying that the images that Guntur made are inscribed by “hands lens”. Guntur’s handmade images, which so closely resemble photographic images, are done by the skill and observation of the artist. It is a fact that many painters and sculptors rely on photographic images in representing a “photographic reality”, just as Eleanor Heartney said,  “A number of artists incorporate photographic ways of seeing into their work.” [iii] In this matter, the works of Guntur is directed to mimic the display and quality of photography.

Photography is the index of the object that it captures (through the help of light and a medium sensitive to light). Just like Roland Barthes said,

“A photograph is indexical because of the way it comes to be. A typical photograph is the results of light bouncing off a subject in the real world, through a lens, and captured on a light-sensitive material such as a negative or stored in pixels in a digital camera.”[iv](Why is it art, p. 47)

So the works of Guntur are indexes from index. In the semiotic approach, index is the sign or image that refers to a reality. In this case, Guntur’s artworks are a construct of twice made index in a way that at first they are believed to be referring to a photograph, which also refers to a certainly real reality (the photos of his friends), and that the photos are an index to real persons, the friends of Guntur. Therefore, we can be sure that Guntur is referring to someone real because we are sure that what Guntur draw is taken from photograph. Intuitively we come to understand and to believe that what a photograph presents is a depiction of the reality, presenting someone or an event that actually happens, not just an artist’s imagination. This is strengthened by Roland Barthes statement, that “in Photography I can never deny that things has been there”. [v]

In addition to what Roland Barthes said, photography can do more than just presenting reality, but also recording reality that cannot be caught by human eye. The technology of photography can present to us the microscopic world, or capture a very quick movement, or to be more precise freeze it, like when a photograph captures and freezes the movement of a bullet. In retrospect, what Roland Barthes believed is actually long juxtaposed by fictional photography, pictures which have no reference to a real world. The development of computer technology, especially image processing software, has given way to the invasion of fictional images – despite their highly realistic appearance. Eleanor Heartney noted this, in that

“Contemporary photograph frequently enlist their art in the service of fiction, contriving elaborate imaginary scenes that might look entirely real. The digital revolution exacerbates the situation, making it possible to produce photograph with no ties to external reality. Entirely convincing settings, characters, and events can be created out of nothing more than a software imaging program.”[vi]

In working on the drawings and paintings Guntur did both of these approach to photography. First, he used the sharpness produced by camera lens to capture the details of his friends’ faces. The visual details, such as the pores, can easily be captured by camera. However, Guntur also manipulated the picture. After the pictures are taken, he cropped, erased the background, changed the color into black and white, and sharpened the details of the faces up to his satisfaction. Afterward, he printed the images and used them as reference in his drawing and painting process. On entering the drawing and painting stage, Guntur entered a seemingly different world. However, his struggle to finish the images of photography through drawing technique and handmade painting is the crucial part and the most important ritual in his working process. As an artist educated in graphic design discipline, and who is until now still works as graphic designer, we need not doubt his knowledge and experience about digital images and its invasion on visual culture. Which led us to the question, why chose such a traditional and simple way to produce images?

It is possible that Guntur wanted to respond to the domination of “intelligent” machine generated images controlled by the designer and artist imagination. However, even in the olden days Guntur had some intimate moments with the painting world. Therefore, Guntur has always been a believer on the handmade issue, on the manual virtuosity, while never say never to the instant process of digital technology. The works in this exhibition shows his intention to test his capacity in executing images using traditional techniques (drawing and painting) to its extreme. He wants to achieve a photographic quality, especially through his drawings. He wants to reverse the instantaneity of photograph into a long and probably painful process of drawing technique. This painstaking process is a choice with implication that is well understood by Guntur. First, the long process in drawing them enabled Guntur to gain a scrutinous observation on his friends, the subject matter. Although what was observed is merely the physical (visual) representation of his friends, in the long process, at least Guntur’s memory regarding the person often come up and play in his mind. It is possible that a different or even new perception was born in Guntur’s mind related to his friends that poses as his model.

According to Guntur, he doesn’t want to take them for granted. We cannot really be sure about how well we know our friends. That is why Guntur’s depiction of his friends is not a usual depiction of a “friend”. The faces in Guntur’s works show a straightforward looks instead of friendly ones. Even to those familiar with the model, the faces in Guntur’s works seems alien. This could very well be the result of the sharpness of the details of these faces: the pores looks very visible, even the faces looks texturized. The faces become alien faces because it shows details that our daily observation lost. In effect, the faces become unfamiliar faces, a bunch of anonym profiles.

We cannot deny our familiarity with images of face. These images invade us everyday through the magazines, Internet, billboard, and TV. The invasion of images of faces in the glossy magazines and the sparkling billboard are closely related to the culture of celebrity. Most of us adore the world and life of celebrity. Our familiarity to the celebrity of the pop culture realm obviously not the result of our direct meeting with them, but the result of our encounter with the images – especially the advert – in the mass media. Even when the ad used “common people” as their model – with a persuasion that the product is for the common man – as time goes by the model become a constructed image of a celebrity. Many celebrities do start their career as ad model, don’t they? This shows how, in one side, it is hard enough to show face portraits in the contemporary art because they have to compete with the hegemony of celebrity faces in pop culture, while in the other side, the public had grown so familiar to the face images a la popular culture, that it becomes much easier to accept face subject matter, as long as it can seduce audiences. Guntur understands this. Which is why he “seduces” the audiences by representing the images of face ala photograph through drawings.

Meanwhile, although Guntur’s paintings in this exhibition had also used realist technique, they are not as detailed as his drawings, which can be called photorealistic. Some of the artist’s friends in the paintings don’t even have a visible face, because they turn their back at us. While in Guntur’s drawing, face details become the prominent factor, in the paintings; the gesture and style of clothing take the front. It is true that we sometimes recognize our friends through their unique gesture and style of clothing. While in the works of faces entitled, Topography of Face, the problem of personal character and psychological aspect become the crucial factor, in the paintings – entitled Behind the Style – the external aspect, such as cloth styles seems more important. It looks to me that Guntur intentionally took a different approach in his paintings, compared to his drawings. This shows Guntur’s opinion on the character differences on drawings and paintings. This differences in character was once said by Antonio Lopez Garcia, one of Spanish important artist, that  “In other words, painting provides external information, while drawing pulls the viewer into interior space….Painting has a physicality that drives out the psychological sides.” [vii]

It is easy to understand how in the digital era a respect and appreciation on handmade images grows lush. In one point of view, it is senseless to produce images by hand, but in another point of view, in the context of contemporary art, it might just be reasonable. We see how the photography artists strive so hard to show the “uniqeness” of their works by printing them in limited edition. This can be seen as a denial to the nature of the technology, which is able to duplicate photographic images to an almost unlimited quantity. In this point of view the handmade works don’t have to be valued more in quality, or in having more “art value”, but we cannot deny the fact that they have uniqueness because there can only be one for each of them. They can never be repeated in such identical details as photography can. In addition, drawings and painting will easily be accepted as works conventionally included in the tradition of fine art.

Drawings and paintings do often seen as “decadent”, but the media don’t have to justify their existence as art – despite their quality and their value. In the case of Guntur’s works, drawing as medium and technique – which depicts a photographic image by handmade endeavour – is an index that the work is artwork. It can be said that by making them by hand, the works become auratic, just as Tony Schirato explained as he refers to Walter Benjamin opinion, that

“…, in Benjamin’s theory , experience it with works of art because of the trace  of the artist’s presence –though only, he writes, with works that are made by hand, rather than photographic or digital art.”[viii]

In the same tone, Baudrillard said that

“The fascination with artisanal objects derives from their having passed through someone’s hand, and whose labour still is still inscribed on them: it is the fascination with that which has been created (and which is therefore unique, since the moment of creation is reversible).”[ix]

Because Guntur’s works shows index as “artworks”, they instantly become important cultural texts.

“Art is assigned a cultural value that advertisement lack, so it attracts a long, slow gaze, while adverts are there for the sweeping glance only. Art historians are trained to look closely and patiently –to absorb the works with their eyes, and make out its various elements, value and qualities.“[x]

Facing Guntur’s artworks, wouldn’t you do the same thing that Tony Schirato had said?

Asmudjo Jono Irianto

Exhibition Curator

[ii] Ibid, p. 47

[iii] Eleanor Heartney, Art & Today, New York: Phaidon Press Inc., 2008, p. 97.

[iv] Op. Cit, p. 47

[v] Op.Cit, p. 96

[vi] Ibid, p. 97

[vii] Cheryl Brutvan, Antonio Lopez Garcia, Boston: MFA Publication, 2006, p. 98.

[viii] Tony Schirato dan Jen Webb, Reading the Visual, Crown Nest, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 2004, p. 119.

[ix] Ibid, p. 121

[x] Ibid, p. 106.