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<big><font face="Georgia">Talk about pollination ... howbout
crosspollinating with an Indonesian collective looking for
international collaborators? </font></big><br>
<br>
<big><font face="Georgia">josh </font></big><br>
<br>
<big><font face="Georgia">-------- Original Message --------</font></big>
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<th align="right" nowrap="nowrap" valign="baseline"><big><font
face="Georgia">Subject: </font></big></th>
<td><big><font face="Georgia">[SpAzLiSt] INDONESIA
Collaboration-- Sustainable Arts Network International</font></big></td>
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<th align="right" nowrap="nowrap" valign="baseline"><big><font
face="Georgia">Date: </font></big></th>
<td><big><font face="Georgia">Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:04:10 -0000</font></big></td>
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<th align="right" nowrap="nowrap" valign="baseline"><big><font
face="Georgia">From: </font></big></th>
<td><big><font face="Georgia"><a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:rio@spaz.org"><rio@spaz.org></a></font></big></td>
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<th align="right" nowrap="nowrap" valign="baseline"><big><font
face="Georgia">To: </font></big></th>
<td><big><font face="Georgia"><a class="moz-txt-link-rfc2396E" href="mailto:spazlist@lists.spaz.org"><spazlist@lists.spaz.org></a></font></big></td>
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<br>
<big><font face="Georgia">INDONESIA COLLABORATION-- SUSTAINABLE ARTS
NETWORK INTERNATIONAL</font></big><br>
<br>
<big><font face="Georgia">This is another update from Indonesia about
collaborations with Taring<br>
Padi and the wider community in Java. Its very long but please pay<br>
attention that this is also an invitation and plea for people to get<br>
involved with things either from San Francisco Bay Area or join us here<br>
Indonesia. <br>
<br>
If your interested in coming to Indonesia, there's help with financing
it<br>
available through a rolling deadline $2000 travel grant offered from the<br>
USINDO society. This is for the purpose of some educational/cultural<br>
exchange or conference, and we can help you arrange the info needed to<br>
qualify. The website is
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.usindo.org/education/travelgrants.html">http://www.usindo.org/education/travelgrants.html</a><br>
<br>
Once here there are free places to stay including at Taring Padi space
10<br>
min bike ride from the city in a beautiful friendly jungly village area,<br>
or squatting an empty building at the Gampingan Museum campus which is
big<br>
social gathering place for everyone and has wifi and the “squattable”<br>
building was made cozy and cute by our Cyclown friends who were here. <br>
Also for longer stays you can rent your own house for a few hundred<br>
dollars a YEAR. Its amazingly cheap to live here, a meal is usually less<br>
than $1 and the community is helpful, radical, and collective style.<br>
<br>
The specific projects that we need help with are listed towards the
bottom<br>
of this post if you want to skip down to whats currently going on in<br>
Yogyakarta.<br>
<br>
<br>
So finally back in Indonesia… Arriving here was like a moment of truth<br>
metaphorically and literally in regards to being able to start
actualizing<br>
the projects I have been planning and obsessing over. I will see if
what I<br>
talk (since I talk so much) has something to back it eventually. Also a<br>
moment of truth in addressing more personal issues that were left<br>
lingering when I last left Indonesia.<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
&#8592;Backtrack Overview&#8594;<br>
<br>
Last time I was in Indonesia I was staying with Taring Padi collective
and<br>
theorizing everyday about collaboration ideas and how to connect our<br>
communities more. Over the years a few SPAZ crew have been to Indonesia<br>
and involved with Taring Padi. We talked about trying to get some Taring<br>
Padi crew to the states to do a tour with SPAZ, but a big issue to<br>
overcome was funding for such an endeavor. When I returned to the states<br>
in the end of September I devoted the four months I was there to burying<br>
myself in research on the non-profit funding world. I knew that the main<br>
goal was to get money to pay for airfare and visas for Taring Padi, but<br>
exactly what the proposed project was, why it was socially, culturally,<br>
and artistically beneficial, what angle to take, and who to get funding<br>
from was mind boggling. I had a lot of bits of info to start researching<br>
but in the end the problem was credentials, track record, and 501c3<br>
status, or sponsorship from another non-profit group to vouch for us in<br>
order to receive funds for any project. After going to some conferences
in<br>
SF about non-profit stuff, tons of internet research, and being a<br>
bookworm, getting Media Island in Olympia to fiscally sponsor us, I
wrote<br>
one grant proposal to the San Francisco Foundation…which was
unsuccessful-<br>
But a very big learning experience. What its come down to now is the<br>
formation of the Sustainable Arts Network International (SANI), which I<br>
still pretty theoretical, but will (once I’m back in the states later
this<br>
year) file for federal non-profit status. SANI acts as an umbrella to<br>
connect art communities for research, documentation, collaboration,<br>
exchanges, and information sharing to develop long term working<br>
relationships with a focus on using art as a vehicle for social and<br>
ecologic justice/awareness. (Within a grass-roots framework we are
working<br>
together globally to improve our communities locally) There is a focus
on<br>
solidarity with less developed countries. Basically this be our<br>
user-friendly face and will help keep track of all of our international<br>
wanderings and in the future provide funding possibilities to travel and<br>
do collaborative projects and invite our international friends to the<br>
states. I have on file a constantly edited version of what SANI is, the<br>
mission statement, the details, and so on. So now realizing that getting<br>
funding to ship a bunch of radical Indonesian art activist to the USA
is a<br>
bit further in the future we are here working on creating a track record<br>
of smaller projects… <br>
<br>
<br>
&#8592;Jakarta Overview&#8594;<br>
<br>
So arriving in Jakarta we stayed a few nights on campus at the Jakarta
Art<br>
Institute (IKJ), hosted by our friend Yuda with the Sakit Kuning<br>
Collective. <br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://sakitkuning.blogspot.com/">http://sakitkuning.blogspot.com/</a><br>
<br>
The campus is crazy and painted and half run down in continual
renovation.<br>
Most of the students squat the campus, especially since other options<br>
would mostly be commuting outside of the city to their family’s homes.<br>
People seem to be hard at work on projects but there is a lot of chillin<br>
at the open air café’s smoking and drinking, especially at night when
the<br>
faculty is gone and the campus is more like a big art commune. <br>
<br>
We were also hanging out with Toni from Taring Padi who was in Jakarta
and<br>
he brought us to Ruang Rupa art collective space to stay while in
Jakarta,<br>
but still spending alot of time at IKJ.<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.ruangrupa.org/home/about_eng.html">http://www.ruangrupa.org/home/about_eng.html</a><br>
<br>
Ruang Rupa had an awesome space, which was big with multiple large
rooms,<br>
computer/office room, library, kitchen, bedrooms. We had our own
guestroom<br>
too. They do a lot of film and video works, documentation and research<br>
stuff including producing the OK film festival, and Karbon (a quarterly<br>
journal focusing on topics like alternative spaces, performance art,<br>
audience…)<br>
<br>
Yuda set up events on the IKJ campus for us to give a<br>
presentation/discussion with a bunch of the students introducing<br>
ourselves, our art, SPAZ, and our ideas for a new non-profit Sustainable<br>
Arts Network International (SANI). We broke it up into two parts with a<br>
little slideshow of photos. We talked about stuff like examples of art<br>
communities in the states, how we use our urban and natural environment
to<br>
provide what we need, resourcefulness, DIY mentality… Importance of
space,<br>
physical space like shared studios, buses for tours, festivals like
Mutant<br>
Fest, other events, and mental space… Importance of collaboration and<br>
networking locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally. How to<br>
make money as an artist and support yourself, but also continue creating<br>
art within your community without monetary needs/expenses. How to use
your<br>
art focus like theater for example for self-designated ideas and<br>
experimentation with in process development and public art like street<br>
theater, as apposed to only auditioning for other peoples shows,
preparing<br>
your art for prestigious stage theater or cinema/television acting. <br>
<br>
Second, we talked about our particular art focus together as performance<br>
and circus theater/music. We did some performance stuff and took an<br>
audience volunteer to do a theater workshop and Maya used technique
about<br>
character development of facial expression, speach, posture, movement,<br>
costume, makeup, props. And of course a little acrobalance stuff too.<br>
<br>
Friday we did a performance with Sakit Kuning and some other performance<br>
groups with experimental music and projection. We were interviewed by a<br>
local television channel in reference to young artists, and they talked<br>
with Sakit Kuning and some people there about what was going on. <br>
<br>
IKJ gave us certificates of appreciation for workshops, presentation,
and<br>
performances which included our names, SPAZ, and Sustainable Arts
Network<br>
International. This is a good step in building a track record and<br>
credentials. <br>
<br>
We even got to go to an awesome Drum and Bass party put on by<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.javabass.com">http://www.javabass.com</a>. Our friends Asung from Rueng Rupa DJ’d and
Eloopz<br>
from Sakit Kuning MC’d too. Fucking amazing. The energy was awesome, the<br>
venue was quite posh, though still underground and tucked away in a
corner<br>
of the city. People danced all night long. We left the party early when<br>
things were still jumping at about 3am.<br>
<br>
I brought with me about a bunch of Beehive Collective posters and about
50<br>
art/anarchist/history zines from the states for indi-literature exchange<br>
and gave copies of some to a girl who does zine distro in Jakarta and
she<br>
gave me a stack of stuff she had too. I’ve been reading a lot of local<br>
journals and zines from Java understanding layers to whats going on
here.<br>
We also visited a few other community spaces and collectives in Jakarta<br>
too.<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
&#8592; Yogyakarta and Future Project Overview&#8594;<br>
<br>
So being in Yogyakarta is a nice change of pace though especially
because<br>
its been our destination during this journey and I can feel a bit of
rest<br>
and settling. This morning we walked through the village that the Taring<br>
Padi space is at to a “restaurant” to eat near the river. We walked<br>
between houses with smiling children playing outside, goat stables, free<br>
roaming chickens, people constructing new buildings with bamboo, to a<br>
small house with tables out front which functions as a little village<br>
café.<br>
<br>
Taring Padi arranged for the Yogyakarta National Museum at Gampingan to<br>
give us letters of invitation for art residencies for use to extend our<br>
visas and also apply for a small grant from the USINDO society. The main<br>
projects with them right now will be to work on curating a “call to<br>
artists” Second Hand themed exhibition at Gampingan and organizing with<br>
some folks (maybe ArtSF) for a simultaneous exhibition to happen in San<br>
Francisco. This would be a two-part exhibit, which will include swapping<br>
the artwork for a second display the American artwork in Yogya, and the<br>
Indonesian artwork in SF. We want the develop a deeper thesis of<br>
questioning, implied value, things passed down, stories told, antiquity
vs<br>
new, consumerism, reuse, and also a double meaning of the exhibition
being<br>
second hand with the trading of artwork between countries. We have lots
of<br>
ideas of how to make this exhibit interactive and participatory
involving<br>
video projects, documentation, "free-box" donations requests from all
the<br>
people who attend the exhibit then donating the stuff to a school or
group<br>
who needs it.(freebox is not a common practice yet in Indonesia) If
anyone<br>
has ideas for the SF side please let me know.<br>
<br>
We also just got the opportunity to be involved with a Global Warming<br>
awareness art festival, which Taring Padi is also involved with. This
will<br>
be April 15-20. Clear ideas for what we will contribute have not been<br>
formulated but the invitation is there. We invite anyone to join us here<br>
by then to create a workshop, and or performance for this festival.<br>
<br>
Also since we have access to a very nice video camera I want to work on
a<br>
Taring Padi documentary about current issue with new footage,
collecting,<br>
editing, and translating old footage. I’ll be doing a lot of
photography,<br>
maybe painting a little bit, playing music, working on performance stuff<br>
with Maya, working with children, and whatever else comes up.<br>
<br>
<br>
Please feel free to repost this. I tried to post it on the spaz site as
a<br>
report, but was having problems... so next time I will try to post it on<br>
the site and some more photos.<br>
<br>
<br>
So we’ll see how things go from here…<br>
<br>
<br>
Thanks thanks thanks<br>
Rio<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
<br>
------<br>
_______________________________________________<br>
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