Asian Transformations in Action - Api-fellowships.org

REFIGURATION OF IDENTITIES AND FUTURES IN TIMES OF TRANSFORMATION 115might have been women. Although many in the audiencewere indeed female, there were very few female artistsor art students. While I spent some time at a local artacademy and went to art performance events, I met onlya few female art students. One internationally knownfemale Indonesian artist, who is self-taught, said thatthere is still unspoken discrimination against womenin Indonesian art institutions. There seem to be feweropportunities and little encouragement for women toexpress themselves in an artistic form. Therefore, whenthey come across an opportunity to speak out in publicwithout fear of sanctions, they pour out their mostpersonal secrets.Another issue that came up in the discussion is theabsence of current socio-political topics in thesesecrets. One discussant said that perhaps this is due tothe young generation’s apathy to anything political.In the 1990s, when there was political turmoil andthe student movement in Indonesia was very strong,artistic expressions were also predominantly concernedwith social and political issues. After several changes ingovernments, the younger generation now seems to bemore concerned with their personal relationships. Oneolder artist at the discussion said that now most of themiddle-class youth in urban areas are turning a blindeye to the suffering of people in deprived regions.Indeed, when I spoke with young art students, theypreferred talking about famous Japanese pop artistsand comics rather than about victims of the recentearthquake, floods, poverty and corruption. This is,however, not a particularly Indonesian phenomenon.The commercialization of art and globally marketedpopular culture are spreading all over the world, whichis precisely the reason why I started this project in Japanin the first place. For over ten years now, I have beencreating art works that directly deal with issues of conflictand history. However, in recent years, it has becomeincreasingly difficult to communicate with youth, whoseem to have very little interest in or knowledge aboutJapan’s recent history. They seem more concernedabout their daily lives and relationships with their smallcircle of friends and family. I want them to realize thattheir personal issues and grievances can be related tosocial structures and political issues, including history.Acknowledging and sharing the pains of the personalcan be a strong political action.The absence of real political issues and the prevalence ofpersonal, sexual issues in the secrets collected, therefore,do not mean that there is little political awareness inIndonesia. Providing this little space to breathe andrelease the personal can lead to the acknowledgementof these voices that have not previously been heard, andthe finding of relevance for their experiences. Perhapsthis kind of “sexual politics” can lead to change in thereal political structure.After completing the project in three countries (inaddition to Japan and Korea), my findings share thefollowing similarities:1.2.3.There is much violence and oppression hiddenbehind the façade of seemingly harmonious “Asianfamily values.” In each country, the majority offamily secrets pertain to domestic violence, sexualabuse and other suffering caused by a strict familystructure.The ones suffering and silenced are mostly womenand young people. Although the secrets were writtenanonymously, I deduced the writers’ gender andage group from the writing style and language. Thesocial structure they live in forces them to remainquiet; thus, their problems become internalized.The above problems arise from a lack of education,gender inequality, poverty, religious dogmatism,and changing value systems. The last one seems tobe particularly prevalent in the Asian region, wheremodernization, globalization and capitalizationhave been occurring at a very rapid pace, andleaving huge gaps between male and female, youngand old, rich and poor, and urban and rural people.Social inequality seems to be getting worse, andthe oppressed and weak are becoming increasinglysidelined and ignored.Conclusions and ImplicationsThe original purpose of this project was to create a safespace in which the public and the personal could meetanonymously. In such a space, personal problems arerecognized and empathized with by the public and theircauses politicized. However, now that I possess over2,000 secrets, I believe I have some kind of responsibilityto develop the project further to seek out the possiblerole art can play in the actual recovery process. Whileon the one hand, there is a definite need to change thesocial structures that cause these problems, on the other,there is an immediate need to help those who sufferfrom them. Some of the secrets I collected are indeeddesperate cries for help. Changing social structures is along-term goal, but empowering the victims, throughart, is a more urgent need.The workshop I conducted with girls at C.R.I.B.S.Asian Transformations in ActionThe Work of the 2006/2007 API Fellows