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Lot Essay
Sudjojono's landscape work should not be viewed merely as a lyrical representation of nature. In the context of his leading role in expounding the Modernist movement and his vehement attack on the Mooie Indie school (Beautiful Indonesia) which he felt was hindering progressive tendencies in the development of Indonesian Art, he felt that artists, indigenous or foreign, continued to emphasized only the beautiful landscape or women that clearly demonstrates a 'hierarchy of aesthetics' in the choice of subject-matters.
Sudjojono wrote "A pair of old shoes and Hamengku Buwono VII (the king of Yogyakarta), and the banks of the Ciliwung river (smelly waterway running through the center of Jakarta) and the scenery of the Bromo mountains (a cool attractive area with beautiful scenery) are all the same. What gives value to the painting is not convention, but the soul of the painter." (Jim Supangkat, "The Emergence of Indonesian Art" in Indonesian Modern Art and Beyond, Indonesian Fine Arts Foundation, Jakarta, 1997, p. 32).
In the light of these words, Sudjojono could share the same subject as a typical Mooie Indie artist such as the present lot. The depicted mountainous landscape, however conveys a radically different sentiment for which a Mooie Indie artist, such as Basoeki Abdullah would almost without fail, highlights the grandeur and conventional beauty of the mountain.
The present lot is full of the deep emotional resonances which makes him a true expressionist artist and not the least, romantic. In a post-impressionist epoch, Sudjojono certainly recognised the importance in the changes of lighting and its effect on the landscape which he tries to suggest with the graduating shades of greens of the grass. Nevertheless, his works are most importantly about the subtle expressiveness of the landscape and his own poetic note of which he interprets it with the placement of idiosyncratic details, such as hen depicted on the left corner and the spontaneous figures he painted on the painting. With such details, the landscape ceases to be detached and majestic, but a place where one can walk along.
Finally, the completed landscape would be a view of a homeland, recounting a tale of the people and its history.
Sudjojono wrote "A pair of old shoes and Hamengku Buwono VII (the king of Yogyakarta), and the banks of the Ciliwung river (smelly waterway running through the center of Jakarta) and the scenery of the Bromo mountains (a cool attractive area with beautiful scenery) are all the same. What gives value to the painting is not convention, but the soul of the painter." (Jim Supangkat, "The Emergence of Indonesian Art" in Indonesian Modern Art and Beyond, Indonesian Fine Arts Foundation, Jakarta, 1997, p. 32).
In the light of these words, Sudjojono could share the same subject as a typical Mooie Indie artist such as the present lot. The depicted mountainous landscape, however conveys a radically different sentiment for which a Mooie Indie artist, such as Basoeki Abdullah would almost without fail, highlights the grandeur and conventional beauty of the mountain.
The present lot is full of the deep emotional resonances which makes him a true expressionist artist and not the least, romantic. In a post-impressionist epoch, Sudjojono certainly recognised the importance in the changes of lighting and its effect on the landscape which he tries to suggest with the graduating shades of greens of the grass. Nevertheless, his works are most importantly about the subtle expressiveness of the landscape and his own poetic note of which he interprets it with the placement of idiosyncratic details, such as hen depicted on the left corner and the spontaneous figures he painted on the painting. With such details, the landscape ceases to be detached and majestic, but a place where one can walk along.
Finally, the completed landscape would be a view of a homeland, recounting a tale of the people and its history.