Critical Recycling: Post-Consumer Waste as Medium and Meaning in Contemporary Indonesian Art

Abstract

This paper sets out to investigate how and why Indonesian contemporary artists invoke the materiality of post-consumer waste as an art medium. To do so, I look back on the history of environmental art and the found object in Indonesia, and the exhibitions and practices of artists and critics contemporary to that history. From the present day I analyse specific works by Tisna Sanjaya (b. 1958), Tita Salina (b. 1973) and I Made Bayak (b. 1980), drawing on conversations with the artists to understand the intentions and resonances of post-consumer waste as art medium in Indonesia. Understanding the historical precedents to this increasingly dominant practice in Indonesian demonstrates a continuity of concern among artists, and a drive to innovate on past practices. Show more