INTIMATE COLORS

by. ARGUS F. S

 

Abstraction as a methodology in the art practice of Indonesian artists today can say as a unique concept. That method were presented by combining the painterly painting, drawing and appropriation of imagery - indeed the discourse of medium also considered to be important today. The representation of ideas with this method of abstraction is more detailed in the production of its artistic languages. The art practice in this category reemerges among the mainstream of the illustrative language of representation – through representational figures, such as comics in the paintings.

What he produce when he was working in southern Bali and Yogyakarta were the abstraction of the Balinese culture and Yogyakarta as well. He use a new abstraction method in the entire production ecosystem of his artistic language. 

He uses acrylic paint on paper, plastic, rubber, canvas, and so on. The idea of his work was much born from the situations also the social field of both urban communities in Indonesia and the geo-culture.

 

Until then he was interested in color issues and chemical reactions of the acrylic paints. Thus, the reading of Richard Irwin Meyer’s painting can be reconnected to the values of abstract expressionist artists as the historical references. Richard use the exploration of forms and the essence of the orders of aesthetic who constructed by material discourse. Seeking its expression thesis in the realm of Indonesian contemporary art from the process. There is no longer speaks about material function as a structure of language. He is looking something beyond the surfaces of paints.

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Richard Irwin Meyer’s artworks are stated in the world of new painting discourse in which he learn from the history of modern art who has taken place during the post-World Word II periods in New York city. 

 

As an artists who live in between the post-abstract expressionist movement and contemporary art world, Richard Irwin Meyer is still looking for new order of artistic achievements in the contemporary art today through his personal point of view. So, his paintings have been moved away from the language who developed by the abstract expressionist artists, because what he is working by now is develop the newest abstraction method in contemprary art world.

His paintings also do not embed narratives as commonly found in works of art in the archipelago. The subject matter of his paintings are answering the question; how a certain types of acrylic paints and the medium on his hand used to build non-narrative abstraction. Therefore, the material of paintings becomes very important rather than the story behind the drawing. Indeed, his drawing constructed by the spontaneous composition of the lines and the colored field. He is believe that the pigment colors will telling you more about paintings. Richard Irwin Meyer also uses additional material that is often mixed on acrylic paints. He observes the chemical process of elaborating the intermediate in the field of canvas or rubber as well as paper and other medium.

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We can learn that his creative process is lays down on the originality and organic works. He refuses to produce a kind of ‘visual revision’ or appropriation forms which taken from works who has been collected by art museums. He is thinking about what would happen tomorrow in the world of painting. He said, that the identity of an artist is viewed from an authentic, organic and original work which coming from the intimate process through the colors. 

There are interesting and important works from his hand since he moved to Yogyakarta in 2015. His turning point to the new abstraction marked by his one man show at Yogyakarta in 2014. Then, the art collectors can see and learn how his paintings contribute into the world of contemporary art – the abstraction of both Indonesian culture and nature - while he attach the humanistic values of Asian society as the content of his works.

 

The recent works from Richard Irwin Meyer are more important to see how he always moving into new feeling and visual art discourse through his paintings. It not about form anymore. It is all about time and space where acrylic paints intearct each other upon the medium. This “Intimate Colors” exhibition can say as the artistic statement in which he present what is colors on acrylic paints gone to be a painting. Interference colors might be the keyword to see his painting in person then one would found the space who attaching the time and feeling on each layers.***