VIRTUAL DISPLACEMENT
The Manifestation of Humanistic Aesthetic and New Spirituality
[The Influence of The Creating Process]
Virtual worlds existence as a product of information technology made several serious basic questions on the means of information to the consciousness of existence. When humans get to certain point of achievement, it also reaches the existential crisis. The problem is how humans are moved again and keep having its consciousness of humanistic existence even if they live in the global information stream yet can keep on exploring their dreams.
[Netok Sawiji_Rusnoto Susanto]
A society living with the contemporary image is now laden with the vary opportunities of movements, changes and exchanges in the highly accelerated space and time colored with the urban cultural trend that tends to keep searching for new images that can be observed through body languages —gestures— and characters of urban citizens who stodges the cityspaces with their activities. The highlights of imaging turnovers in various media are uncontrollable up to the launchings of private television channels, capitalistic product competitions, unlimited booms of themes and lifestyles in virtual spaces (internet, television, radio, and electric-screened balihos) and other communication technology products, the glamour of capital markets competition, price fluctuations, expansion of trade and other conglomerations. Then, in such fast and instant discourse, the virtual world now dominates the reality in a way that justifies us seeing it as our 'second nature'. Channel-paths of information are free to “catch” us anytime, anywhere. We seem to consider it as an urgent need; thus immediate access and direct interaction with the virtual world that indulges us in enjoying vary global phenomenon with only depending on fiber optics[1], that has the speed of light, to interact with others and no longer care about physical existence.
Life with the needs of the all-quick things, spur the emptiness and fatalism. For the activities of life spent working for a cycle that runs highly accelerated has the potential of becoming a trap for man in certain accelerated rhythm that narrows down space and time that in the journey of human life actually relates to spirituality. The highest peak of achievement in such accelerated time is, on the one hand, the increasement of the comfort duration; while on the other hand is the narrowing down of the spirituality, which has a direct impact on the metropolis society who no longer afford to share space and time to only say hi; needless top say, the awareness of the social interaction quality and layers of tolerances that’s lost.
The development of information technology and digital that is furnished with all the consequences of folding of virtual space/time has changed our understandings of various space/time and man movements culturally; such mechanical routines affect our daily lives in a way that we no longer have the power to control it. In the context of the postmodern urban culture, urbanization no longer means people moving to cities in the real space. It is the virtual urbanization; massive man movement to the center of a digital 'cyberspace' (Yasraf Amir Piliang, 2008:360).[2]
The existence of the virtual world as a product of information technology has raised many serious questions about the fundamental meaning of information for the sake of the awareness of existence. Whether man uses information or it is using man. Whether man controls information or vice versa. Whether information exists for man or it is man that exists for information. When man achieves a certain point, they will definitely reach their existentialism crisis. Then, the problem is how the man could maintain temperamentality and regain the awareness of humanistic existence, even in the flow of global information they should still be able to dream away.
1. Cyberspace: Between Need-Life Style
Whenever space must be understood in a broad understanding, of the physical space, mental space, social space, symbolic space, and so forth. The attendance of social development in the information era, and virtualization nowadays lunge at the same time in the space/time that have been sporadically replaced virtually, ie. in the form of being together yet actually separated in different rooms. In fact, the existence of the virtual world is not only an extension of communication system, but also the extension almost every aspect of humans’ life (action, action, reaction, communication). People can now perform various activities (social, political, economic, sexual) remotely (telepresence), without having to make the process of movement in space/time from the station to another station; what’s said as the station is now connected via virtual networks, Internet and cyberspace with no more space/time or physical journey. (Yasraf Amir Piliang, 2008:57-58)
Virtual reality technology is an effort to translate dreams into electronics. The substance of virtual reality basically tries to involve human in the vanishing real world and automatically become a competitor from the actual reality. Virtual reality, a technology that is capable of creating various realities with computer simulation techniques that have been delivering what we know as virtual reality technology, where three-dimensional illusions are able in presenting realistic images. Thus so, the people of the world could access files of latest information through virtual networking space, as if it’s stored in a parent computer even though it is multi-networking. The presence of a universal language that supports the simplicity of many Webs is called hypertext markup language (HTML). It sorts files so that the computer can arrange data in the track and allow it to link to other files —hyperlinks are generally marked with the color blue. Just click on the blue ones on your computer, you would immediately be connected with the files in other Uniform Resource Locators (URL). The excellence of network performance in HTML allows everyone to create content and put them in the web. The result is a data explosion. Kieron O'Hara on the series Postmodern Plato and the Internet says that, in the Web there are around 2.5 billion definitive data, the amount of the extraordinary large (as much as 7.5 billion gigabytes) ... and, this makes the internet as an engine for the diversion of human capabilities. (Kieron, 2002:31)
Another statistics form Matthew Symonds, in Kieron O’Hara, said that most of the technology observers consider Internet as a significant change in the technology world that brings philosophical attractions. At the same time, the others worries that Internet would only cause trouble. Of course, it is important that we don’t exaggerate this kind of self-defense; especially if we realize that half if the world’s population never uses telephone (Kieron, 2002: 32). Yet the available explosive data and content could be as significant in the growth of the world’s citizen; in the perspective that technology groth is actually not related with the earth’s destruction but to languane and the system management of change and the existence in context.
According to Heidegger in Yasraf Amir Piliang (1999: 173), contemporary society gets to an era where human existence is nothing more than an image. The image finds its ironic form, which in it instead of the truth, message and ideological means, “the free game” of signs and codes are vocal. Today, codes have achieved its turn back point, when it is no longer a paradigm, convention or a final rules that formed a certain structure. Then, in the fast moving space/time, folding and accelerations of all concerns are actualized in its virtual form. That brings us to no longer needing to breakthrough spaces/time or considering distances in order to achieve certain goals (activities that are significantly represented). This fact contributes to a social change in lifestyles as the manifestation of consciousness existence and logical consequences. The impact of science and technology growth colors the all-Internety lifestyle in doing so many activities such as cyber-styled businesses, picnic styles, learning style, entertainment style, sexual style and so many others. The Internet lifestyle is marked by innovative applications and vast growing software’s. People follow the short-living updates of software and hardware growth. In such condition, the life cycle of a product tends to be shorter and new products keep replacing them, with the premise of more power, more complex, more interesting and more stylish.
The encouragement of consumerism becomes a problem the world’s citizen, where the needs of trend —emphasizes in the aspects of innovation such as design— goes beyond the needs of function, a more fundamental aspect, although we can not use the application optimally. We are proud of this all-is-easy lifestyle, fast with certain high levels of comfort that we don’t realize that we are inheriting such lifestyle to the next generation or even triggering next bigger changes with different levels of achievements.
2. Humanistic Consciousness and Existentialism Perspective
Evolutionary, humanism is the starting steps of the paradigm that puts human as the central point of cosmocentric evolution, the steps where cosmocentric ended then humans’ change their paradigm to theocentric (believing in God). Dramatic revolution happens when postmodern formed the existence of a group of limited identities and its movements are fragmented into several identities that compete each other and tends to be unstable. Heidegger, in Yasraf Amir Piliang (2008: 45), formulated that seeing the world as a precondition of existence. If the concept exists, it means that in the world where one can’t be separated from the other ones it existed. It means that existence can never be without the world as its container. Vice versa, there wouldn’t be any means of the world, for existence, if no humans see its means. Existing in the world exists in the existential world.
According to modern historiography, humans realized that they themselves manipulate their past, and design their future. When humans’ intellectual consciousness are brighter and gets its central position, it then can reduce its empirical experiences and creativity to find themselves as the main character of histories and vocal point of the sources of many aspects. At the end, they’d have to face things other things than just thinking, which is to be something new, to negate something new and to represent new values. (Friedrich Nietzsche, 2002:189)
Postmodernism bring along humans to see reality up to the level where our consciousness are built that only ‘reality’ is not enough without questioning sense and not the actual fact about that. The domination of virtual world triggered the speed that also impacted on existential crisis that had freed human from many time/space obstacles and made humans have choices and applies the instant ways of live, which also trapped themselves into the speedy stream of dependences. Baudrillard, in Haryatmoko (2007: 33), stated that imagery disqualifies the category of truth that it could no longer be differentiated between reality, representations, simulations, fakeness and hyper reality. There’s an empowerment of truth that comes out, powers that are seen as a sign of the rising of objects yet loosened substances. Krisna Murti (2006: 48) sees media as an expansion of his/her body is a form of an individual claim: a reaction to the body-commodity regime that is now played by entertainment and lifestyle industry through mass media. The findings of digital technology facilitates humans to the cyber-relations with each virtual biography, guerilla spirit seems to get a fresh blood.
Next is the existentialism issue for humans’ here, we reap the excess of virtual world that created such life model; panicky, hurried and emotional. As Gleick in Yasraf A. Pilliang (2008: 63) said, the model of such life made us in certain anxiousness, hurriedness and marks our impatience.
3. Virtual Displacement and The Image Concept
A. Patience is The Concept of Image
Forming an idea about an object and forming a simple idea about an object is not the same; quoting Hume in Sartre, reference of an idea that is united with no relation at all, which in it has no characteristic. Now, it is impossible to form an idea about an object that includes quality and quantity because both have no precise standards, so there’s an impossibility in forming an unlimited idea that is not ruled by those two facts. (Jean-Paul Sartre, 2001:6-7)
Based on such view, the idea of, say, a book doesn’t have anything to do with the real book. Not a book that exists in the out world, but a book that only I can feel; it is not paper-based books or leaf-based books that differentiate the idea of a book and another virtual objects. However my idea is, it is still an idea of a book. Having the idea of a book is not consciously having a book. This is shown by the facts that what is true about an object is also true on as an idea. If the object has a certain quality and quantity, so as the idea and this is the strategic area where imagination reinterprets a certain image (virtually) in the different visual forms.
B. Imaginative Consciousness Positions Object as Nothingness
A unreflective consciousness about something imagines heterogenic objects for consciousness: for example, sex in imaginative consciousness, in a virtual frame, makes us imagine erotic scenes, objects passing by in the monitor which basically is external to consciousness that comes out from any inner self that is definitely egoistic.
If this is how we explain consciousness, as we knew, we have to build a new consciousness, the reflective one. Because the first consciousness is wholly a consciousness about sex, free sex or virtual free sex. Because this consciousness does not have other objects than virtual objects that had been confirmed from our observing experience as an image, and the arena of consciousness is an object of reflection. Transcendental consciousness of sex freedom construct several impulses as an image, then position free sex as a way that is not only perceptual consciousness, but also touches the area of conceptual consciousness, both about the symptoms, readings, up to the effects and the capability of conveying a broader antithesis.
4. Virtual Displacement as a Subject Matter
Of course virtual displacement can be traced on an indication when cyberspace is in a repetitive circle that needless to say experienced the virtual movement. Then when the cyberspace users’ society gets to the paradigm that virtual world is their new form of spiritual mediations, of course the same understanding in the context of social change brings the movement of spirituality as a concept that is beyond the comprehension of our society, which have the concept of spiritual journey in mythical, ecstasy and religiosity spirit. This is the digital narration paradox: paradox between the difference/repetition, novelty/redundancy, future/past. It means that screen as a concrete machine might die; but the screen as an abstract machine will be repeated through several redundant principles of gatherings, arrangements, machines, images, sights and looks. However new the horizon of digital narration that would be spread out in the future, the domination of sights on behalf of other senses would still be repeated. (Jean-Paul Sartre, 2001:363)
Whether we like it or not, digital narration traps us in any chances, so we would be active in it, especially big cities citizens that are active ‘online’ users. As an indicator cyberspace users active in Asia, if you refer to the Information Society Index (Information Society Index, ISI) is created by the IDC (International Data Corporation) and Word Times, for 55 countries' in the field of intensive Information Technology (IT). According to IDC, ISI has created a standard which all countries measured by the ability to access and absorb information and information technology. According to ISI in 1998 (see table 6.1), Australia, Japan, Singapore, Hongkong, New Zealand, Taiwan, and South Korea are in the top half countries that use IT intensively. Other Asian-states far behind: Malaysia is on the order of 36, while the Philippines, Thailand, China, India, and Indonesia, respectively reside at the 47, 48, 51, 52, and 53. Rank Asian countries in 1999 is still the same, down to the ... India-54. On the other hand, Taiwan, Malaysia, Indonesia and the rise of positions 18, 35 and 52. Other countries, including a more prominent among the other countries (Thailand, China and Indonesia). (Assafa Endeshaw, 2007:155 and 157)
Developing and developed countries’ tendency on Internet’s progress are so dominant in Asia-Pacific. Boldly, Assafa Endeshaw said that the basic reaction on Internet, which some people call self-defense, is controlling Internet access as if it is a broadcasting medium, like some Asia-Pacific countries did. (Assafa Endeshaw, 2007:159)
In the postmodernism that refers to many changes and developments in contemporary culture, the main paradigm is not clear. I assume that serious symptoms of changes is occurring in a variety of cultural discourse today, this discourse is not simply a virtual displacement, but has become the only monster born of cybernetics which has the potential to control a flow of human culture today. For sure, there are basic clefts (which are also empty) after all disciplines are considered dead (the end of ideology, the end of nation-state, the end history, the end of art, the end of science). Bambang Sugiharto (2006:6) said that the uncertain situation causes the rise of new spiritualities: new age, cyber-spirituality, apocalyptic movies, meditation programs, pilgrimages, psychology therapies and soothsayers, religion venerations without dogmas and experiences.
In such situation, the spiritual space is understood as otherness, something mysterious and unformulated behind the reality that tends to see ideas relatively and faith as an inevitable potential of deconstructibility. Meanwhile, in the social area, appear hyper-reality phenomenon along with consumerism at its most extreme point, the nihility of means. Society is mastered and ruled by the media, worshipping bodies and the development of consumption of latest products and fashion, drown in the ecstasy of information. (Alfathri Adlin, 2006:31)
5. Basic Process of Creation
To be frank, an effort of imitating humans on behalf of the universe is done by the hands of an artist is not a mere pure reproduction. Supposedly soul saving is pushed into the creation process so it upgrades the value of anything being referred —the inspiration source. Maeterlinck, in Wassilly Kandinsky, translated by Sulebar (2007:106), boldly stated, “There’s nothing on earth that craves in curiosity of beauty or being drowned in it, from the soul. That is why some mortal souls stays in the lead of some souls that gives the beauty.” As the basic of creation process, I refer to a theory by Wassilly Kandinsky in Sulebar’s translation (2007:109), that what firstly becomes inspirations are: (1) impression: a direct impression towards outward nature that is expressed in pure artistic form; (2) improvisation: a spontaneous expression of the unconscious inner character, thus from the nonmaterial nature; (3) composition: an expression of inner feeling that is slowly built by meetings of the inner feeling and the outer world where he lives that only appeals after a long certain maturity.
Picture 1.
Painted by Rose Bleckner, Oceans, 304.8 x 365.8 cm, oil wax on canvas, 1984 (Emily and Jerry Spiegel Collection, New York)
Source: Klaus Honnef, Contemporary Art, Taschen, 1988, p. 32
Picture 2.
Painted by Yaacov Agam, Transparent Rhytms II, (2 view), 12’1” x 13’2” ,1/4”, oil on aluminum, 1967-1968
Source: Daniel Wheeler, Art Since Mid-Century, Thames and Hudson, New York, 1991, p. 234-235
The works of Yaacov Agam and Rose Bleckner inspires my creative process. Both of these works strongly creates optical illusion’s and played my emotions into deeper spaces it made, other than their extraordinary artistic achievements. At least, the frontal artistic aspects becomes my simple reference before doing technical analysis and comparing to previous works that could turned to the basic of creation process.
The aesthetics I follow, as Kant said, is the taste-aesthetics, “Because taste must be an original ability.” (Hans-Georg Gadamer, 2004:49) There’s only a little number of revisions and modifications, here and there, as my creative effort to represent a personal visual text. My aesthetical vision is to response the simulation of simultaneously moving variables, active, dynamic and with making structured changes in order to avoid chaos and disharmony. Since art is about chaos, relativity and inconsistency, so it is a common thing for artists to find their own creation process in order to overcome its own problems, both conceptually and practically, just like nature that can heal itself whenever its damaged.
Virtual displacement is a subject matter in this final assignment. I am inspired by cyberspace that is extraordinarily interesting to trace its symptoms and significant changes that affect the formation of contemporary society. How virtual movement could sporadically be presented and lunge into corners of our activity spaces and brings us to the new condition and new paradigm that slowly leads to a certain format on the context of latest social asset.
Of course virtual displacement can be traced on an indication when cyberspace is in a repetitive circle that needless to say experienced the virtual movement. Then when the cyberspace users’ society gets to the paradigm that virtual world is their new form of spiritual mediations, of course the same understanding in the context of social change brings the movement of spirituality as a concept that is beyond the comprehension of our society, which have the concept of spiritual journey in mythical, ecstasy and religiosity spirit.
‘Virtual displacement’ is when we are at the wide space of contemplation, supposedly when we are in the deepest dimension of ourselves to trace the vocal point of virtual changes or even movements. Virtual displacement in the context of soul-scape definitely becomes a different discourse because there in this problem I am trying to ensure this thesis indicates the appearance of problems that then could creatively be reinterpreted with personal understandings, consciousness and pluralities. The basics of humanistic studies are needles to say comprehensively related.
That context made it powerful in the living creative activity into whatever form that births cultural narrations implicitly. A widen of the big changes of narrations these days carried by contemporary society with the pattern of culture forming continuously and realized as the change of the previous cultural narration. Yet, that appeared and then ticked by certain social realities that happens as an new tendency through new cultural products and social construction as the indicator of its development. Supposedly, soul-scape is a reinterpretation of our virtuosity in seeking virtual displacement, when we can afford to record the symptoms of virtual movements, changes and shifts in our soul, along with documenting the essence and the existence.
Yet, supposedly soul saving is pushed into the creation process so it upgrades the value of anything being referred —the inspiration source. The basic of my creation process was several approaches that can build discourses, consciousness, idea and attitudes/actions of mine to communicate critical contemplation of contemporary phenomenon.
1. Inductive Approach Method
The use of inductive method is free from metaphysical assumptions and seemed to be free from seeing the realization of the observed phenomenon. Someone don’t just find certain causes, but only firming similarities. Then it is not important whether someone believes in the freedom of will or someone is still bias in making predictions in social spaces. To make deductions from the one orderliness to another that is related to this phenomenon is hoped to not assume anything about the character from the context that is predicted its orderliness. Free decisions involvement no longer mixes with arranged processes but directly related to general quality and arrangements that’s found by inductions; which is an ideal thing, from one erudition or society science that is developed systematically. In that context, someone’s started on stepping on social-psychological thoughts.
Socio-historical experience can precipitate and form science with an inductive procedure from social sciences, that is applying the general experience on object of a specified research with the whole historical knowledge. History researches —phenomenology— tries to understand a concrete phenomenon as a sample of general rules. In some cases not only to strengthen the regularity that ideally not to understand the phenomenon itself in the actual reality.
2. Husserl’s Phenomenology and Epoche Method
Husserl’s phenomenology was first completely formulated in his masterpiece, Logical Investigation (1900); it took him 10 years. Husserl’s phenomenology adopted the pattern of Kant’s philosophy, transcendental philosophy. Transcendental philosophy itself can’t be translated as a pattern of philosophy that no longer talks about the source and nature of knowledge, but the conditions of knowledge yet being assumed. (Donny Gahral, 2005:149)
Husserl’s phenomenology as a science without presuppositions, for behind Hegel’s philosophy that denies the possibility of science without presuppositions (naturalism and psychology) that had always been haunting philosophy for all these times. (Donny Gahral, 2005:149) Naturalism is an assumption that objects are detached form the subject of knowledge. Objects are an alien thing that then sunk in to the subject’s consciousness. While the trend of psychology is developing between the 19th century logicians, the nature reduces its natural logical entity that merely psychological entities in the logics of human mind.
Husserl wanted phenomenology to be emptied from all factual things. Phenomena can’t be understood as something factual. Phenomenology is a discipline about essences of consciousness and ideal essences of objects as a correlation to consciousness. Husserl than put up a method; Epoche. Epoche is a delay of all assumptions on reality for the sake of bringing out the essence. Without the delay of naturalism and psychological assumptions, we are trapped to the dichotomy of subject-object. Epoche’s objective is to restore our attitudes to the world into the ones that understands, not think about, things. (Donny Gahral, 2005:151)
Epoche presupposes the freedom of choosing and deciding our own perspective concerning a certain phenomenon. Epoche deals with the factual character of human consciousness, the consciousness that always believe that something present that's apart from it should be detached. The detachment of factual nature from consciousness will bring us to a pure phenomenon. When using the phenomenological delay, all factual characters disappear and left out pure consciousness of consciousness as an absolute existence where the objects are always its correlation. This is where Husserl, in Donny Gahral (2005:153), stated that our consciousness have certain directions, consciousness in always being directed to an object. Thus called as consciousness intentionality. The intentional act heading out to transcendent objects.
3. Bildung Humanistic Concept
Bildung humanistic concept clearly shows depth of intellectual changes that made us experience Goethe’s chronicle in today’s reality, meanwhile baroque era had already happen as in the history of the middle era. The usual concepts and keywords need to be redefined, and if we do not accept language automatically but search for self-understandings on a rational phenomenon. Concepts as art, history, creative, experience, genius, external world, interiority, expression, style and symbol are automatically used.
Bildung is an idea that comes earlier than the “natural forms” that refers to external outlook that is now tightly connected to culture and especially showing how humans develop their talent and skill. This becomes clear in the theoretical Bildung idea because to gain a critical attitude where man goes beyond what he/she knows and experiences empirically. As Gadamer (2004:15) said, theoretical Bildung is a universal views in following what is different than his/herself and to find universal views which form that someone can understand something, “something that is objective in its freedom,” without accentuating his/herself.
I use such approach or method as the most simple way of going through, methodologically and systematically procedural, of my creative process. Things related to the sensibility of souls and aesthetic clearly depends on how I intensively secure and institute my creative process. Soul-scape is made to be an intellectual meditation to aim on something sublime, training understandings and sharpen the most personal spiritual depth, with which comes the creative demands to birth values to the furthest layer because it is not easy for the others to be in it, let alone to be in the virtual.
4. Creation Process
In paintings creation process, generally I adapt several common methods that are practically used in different approaches. Those approaches are exploration (brainstorming, etc); among conception exploration (observing intersubjectivities and aesthetical experience on aesthetic structure), visual form explorations and aesthetical explorations. The next stage is improvisation; forming and digging vary visual aspects —artistic— and advancing aesthetic touch in relation to technicalities, analytical sides and intuitions. The evaluation stage evaluates vary relations between ideas, artistic executions and everything related to the depth of impression and expression that is served with some kind of an emotional control and sedimentation in level or comprehensive with vibrated intellectual capacity in the creation process. In between, the explorations are conception exploration (observing intersubjectivities and aesthetical experience on aesthetic structure), visual form explorations and aesthetical explorations.
5. Brainstorming
The stage of creative ideas searching and diggings together with exploring materials (both technically and non-technically), problem solving or a project design that maximize the common ideas exploration phase. Or to simply put it, when I had problems capturing excess symptoms of the virtual world and deciding the visual concepts that could be brought as an important idea of a subject matter, or when I was stuck in visual explorations and ran out of ideas, this is where brainstorming takes its important part.
The creation process that I am doing is based on these priorities: novelty, depth and several actualization such as contemplation, persevere explorations in exploring imaginary spaces to dig new ideas, the braveness in trying new things, wild unlimited explorations so that it is easy to pick on creative and fresh ideas.
6. Conceptual Explorations
Basically, the appearance of conception out of series of serious and in-depth observations on an observed object birthed clusters of intersubjective interpretations. In the observing process, certain aesthetical experience showed and seethed to be executed in to the visual exploration stage and sketches or writings in order to support it as its visual articulation.
The start of a creative process, which is conception exploration, turns so many things into anxiety, confusion, and certain happiness is explored thoroughly in order to get the essence of so many ideas that showed. As the tip of spear for powerful content and substance of an artwork is presented.
7. Visual Exploration
The stage of virtual explorations made continuing visual form analysis possible; as the execution of conception exploration that basis it. I went through various visual explorations through manual and digital sketches and implementation of artistic techniques such as using charcoal, pencil, pen, ink, crayon on quarto papers and recycled papers and ex-woodcut-printed papers also digital print applications.
I went through all that as a minimum requirement before painting with the totality in the real creative process to open all possibilities in the shape aspect, both visual and artistic technique achievements. This visual exploration is a reference for the next ones. The aspect of visual form is the next part being cooked in such creation process as a presentation of ideas that is shown in forms of imagination’s improvisation process. Objectively, visual form does not come from merely artistic needs but as a manifestation of conception and creative anxiety.
Basically, visual form is an achievement that could be observed in an artistic execution that had been made in order to achieve the objective of basic concept formations. If someone sees an art object, then the potency to interpret it as a visual form gets to be more actual. Visual form is supposedly a funded perception; which made it an aesthetical experience whenever there’s a relation between the quality of a visual form. Then, formed an aesthetic structure clusters; that points to the aspects of power in aesthetical experiences that binds together perceptions that is united in a massive cluster that doesn’t point at any signifying content and aesthetical experience but to psychological operations that are aware with content and substance being felling into.
8. Media and Technique Explorations
In media and technique explorations, the process is almost the same with my visual exploration. I started with sketches, when I was in search and diggings of visual forms. In the media and technique explorations, various attitudes are optimally used in the searching process for medias and techniques, so many approaches were used, both conventional and the nonconventional ones. As for the medium of expression, I tried so many possibilities with mixed techniques; such as drawing, digital print, woodcut, impasto, opaque and newspaper collages, ex-printed papers and recycled papers with oils, acrylics and pastels on canvases.
Other media used are oil paints and acrylic special artist products of Windsor and Newton, England. For my drawings, I used charcoals from Rembrant and oil pastel products of Talent and other supporting medias such as applying paper-tapes to create accurate areas. Picasso’s brush, from the smallest to the biggest, Huang Hing, Eterna and Windsor and Newton’s paint-roller or local or Chinese products. Palette knife from Windsor and Newton and Talent. My consideration in choosing those media with certain techniques is merely to support my creation process.
9. Aesthetical Explorations
Aesthetical explorations supposedly is a basic need other than media and technique exploration. But on aesthetic exploration, it is a hierarchy form an artwork to an emotional representation, feelings and intellectuality of an artist. Explorations are done far behind the execution of all ideas, even during the creative process. The aspects of aesthetic structure is a part of the most important aspects in observing aesthetical moments that could be pickings of someone else’s aesthetical experience but then interpreted personally into personal visual representations.
Things related to the cluster of ideas —virtual— goes to visual form issues that have certain powers in the imaging process. This aesthetical moments could be caught and turned into observing materials and for further improvisation on an artwork that is being made. Of course, with a different view and different aesthetical sensibilities also. So that visual images that is still virtual could be opened maximally with certain aesthetic capacity that accommodates the intellectual aspects of an artist.
10. Improvisation
The next step is to improvise; forming and digging vary visual aspects —artistic— and advancing aesthetic touch in relation to technicalities, analytical sides and intuitions. In improvisation stage, I dig and use probability values of so many aspects; those related, or not, with visual, artistic techniques and representations of aesthetic concepts. With digging and opening so many possibilities, hopefully juxtafore or metaphoric approach shows in form of ideas, imaginations, associations and so many imaging; whatever resulting something different, personal and unique.
11. Metaphoric approach
Metaphors are now a subject study in philosophy, and it places a strategic position in postmodern discourses. The understandings of this metaphor is expected to enrich the knowledge of art activists in creating artworks and also articulating ideas and concepts of artworks (M. Dwi Marianto, 2007:28) Metaphoric approach is also one of the most effective approaches in synthesizing the thoughts in relation with deconstruction and existentialism, which is the scalpel of humanism issues as an inspiration of a creative process.
Semiotic approach in creation stage becomes a supporting method in the noisy sublimity and inorderliness showings of so many ideas so that sign has a more autonomous capacity. In so many signs that showed as a virtual idiom actualized in visual texts that relates and correlates significantly in the spirituality context in all of my artworks.
Barthes, in St. Sunardi (2002: 79), defined creative transgression semiotically; creativity that could be explained from ‘innovations’ by putting paradigmatic elements in syntagmatic elements. He mentioned three ways of creative transgression that was each taken from J. Tubiana, Trnka, dan Jacobson: (a) opposition of arrangements, (b) rhymed discourse and (c) rhetoric. These three are only a form on paradigm invasion to syntax. The element of paradigm usually stays in the state of ‘possible’ to be inserted in to reality. Creative transgression could be used to judge cultural creativity that happens today.
When campur-sari music collaborates with dangdut and a set of band equipments, of course it still refers to ‘tale’, yet the image is a new born. The process of making it happen is a strategic material for taking ideas into long series of a creative process. A recontextualization of humanism issues becomes the main concern of my artworks, which is born as a manifestation of thoughts, contemplation and impression in the context of that source of inspiration.
6. Evaluation
The evaluation stage evaluates vary relations between ideas, artistic executions and everything related to the depth of impression and expression that is served with some kind of an emotional control and sedimentation in level or comprehensive with vibrated intellectual capacity in the creation process. In between, the explorations are conception exploration (observing intersubjectivities and aesthetical experience on aesthetic structure), visual form explorations and aesthetical explorations.
Therefore, it becomes a consideration of evaluation process of the creation that refers to conception to weigh more on the content, expression and its substances. Visually, the image is presented in am artistic execution that had been mastered and is an effort to reconstruct ideas and techniques of achievement/visualization of the basic concept of sign-makings and semiotic approach.
7. Analysis
Generally, virtual displacement is understood as a virtual shifting where virtual spaces gives outdoor influences all aspects of the world’s citizens today. The high-speed and folding of time in the development of communication technology becomes the biggest trigger in trapping to a space where cybernetic simulation system is very important in fulfilling the levels of comfort, efficiency and effectiveness. The smallest excess is the forming of lifestyle pattern and the tendency of humanistic consciousness that is going lower and lower, far from what’s used to be called as a local genius. We are often trapped in the pattern of contemporary culture that made us flew far-far away in dreaming beyond the border of reality. This is some kind of a contemporary drug when spaces are easily broken and in a very short time we are already in the virtual spaces. Hopefully that thus in such spaces still have the dreams of being down-to-earth.
Then in between the changing time/space occur folding and acceleration of all forms of interest that existed to be actualize in its virtual form, so to achieve the goal (the various activities that are significantly represented) we do not need to cut through the space/time but we defeat space/time without questioning distance. This contributes to a social change with lifestyles as a consciousness manifestation and logical consequences. The impact of science and technology development made the all-Internety, permissive lifestyle, including changes in business, cyber-style, picnic style, learning style, the style of entertainment, sexual style, and so on. Internet lifestyle, will be characterized by innovations and the fast-changing computer applications and software.
The basic is an effort to represent social symptoms where shifting of attitudes, lifestyle and the formation of world’s citizens characteristic and developing countries like Indonesia as an effect of the world’s communication technology growth. The most striking changes occurred in the big cities, urban areas; a simple indication of world with telecommunication development to reach the its peak point in mastering the simulation technology. And, now, society turned the communication technology development as the most effective media and highly needed ones to support day-to-day activities through the virtual spaces that are always in its reach. However, on the other hand, virtual space has the opportunity to disqualify reality.
One simple example, when virtual space is used to harass others, or even character murder, by giving information that actually is dissimilar with the reality. With animation technology, for example, anyone can easily changed anybody else’s character or figure; this is what commonly happens to popular public figures. Another simple thing, when someone communicates through Facebook, or anything alike, not to mention the 3G facilities; it opens the chance in entering private spaces of anyone. Now, people are loosing each private spaces.
Netok Sawiji_Rusnoto Susanto
Visual artist
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[1] fibre optic: some kind of a fiberglass that had been purified chemically that can send data through light
[2] Cybernetics is a certain discipline that studies the reciprocal-relations between information and control, that allows message from human to machine, machine to human, or from machine to machine to reach to the most effective level. Quoted from Norbert Wiener in Yasraf Amir Piliang, Ibid., p. 404
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