Java Folk Art Furniture Book
My old friend David Smith is an enigmatic character who divides his time between three islands: Bali, Java and Vashon Island near Seattle. His business is furniture, and he’s been collecting antiques in Java for 20 years. As the supply of antiques in the field dwindled, David shifted his focus to furniture making. He has a workshop in the historic town of Blitar in East Java with about 100 local workers crafting furniture for his retail showroom in Seattle and for contract clients.
During two decades of antique-hunting in Java, David has been setting aside his favourite finds for his own enjoyment and has amassed an astounding collection. The pieces he prefers are folk-art furniture from the Ponorogo area, and this is his collection’s strongest suit. He is currently preparing an enormous coffee table book on the collection, to be published in 2009. Art dealer and author Bruce Carpenter is working on the text now.
The Puget Sound Business Journal ran an article on David last month, with a nice portrait, in which he looks – - as ever – - enigmatic.
Photos Dan Schlatter
Bali Commercial Photog with Technical Saavy
I keep coming across the work of a particular Indonesian photographer, Imp Winartho. His Ubud royal cremation photos are among the most dramatic and technically perfect out there. Frankly, I don’t know how he managed to process his raw files and perfect his finished work so quickly, as his images were posted almost before the cremation pyre cooled off. This gives me the impression that Imp is a die-hard, serious, professional photographer, and a browse through his site and his flickr photostream confirms this. This man was apparently born with a camera in his hands.
Imp gets plenty of interesting jobs. Glamourous weddings, fab luxury villas, and his stock is an editor’s dream. He photographed Pantai Lima, the villa complex where we attended a sneak preview event last week. His pix of the party (and the flower balls in the pool) are great.
Chris Lehrecke Furniture : It Just Doesn’t Get Any Better Than This
Almost roshi-like in his clarity, acuity, devotion and low profile, Chris Lehrecke is a modern furniture master whose studio in upstate New York recalls Shaker values in its robust simplicity. Yet Shaker furniture his is not. The simplicity is there, and the earnest sobriety. Yet here is a collection that teaches us that what others might call asceticism is in fact abundance. Aesthetic discipline and adherence to one’s principles is not in fact self-restraint, it’s liberation. This furniture is strong, sculptural, primitive, modern, brut, and refined at the same time. And the proportions are perfect, which is something that cannot be taught. You have it or you don’t. Click. Look. Read. Learn. Buy.
San Francisco Asian Art Museum Supporters Visit Macan Tidur
The “Jade Circle” of the San Francisco Asian Art Museum visited our Ubud gallery last week during a cultural tour of Bali. Accompanied by chief curator, Forrest McGill, they arrived dressed in Balinese adat clothing, looking elegant. It wasn’t “fancy dress day” for the Jade Circle, they were dressed to attend the royal cremation ceremony taking place in Ubud later that day.
During their morning at Macan Tidur, I delivered a lecture on diversity in Balinese textile traditions, which was followed by a lively discussion and some hands-on study of textiles. I had put up an entire wall of traditional Balinese textiles from my collection, which looked a bit like a souk, but certainly illustrated the tremendous diversity of Balinese textiles. From prada to ider-ider with talismanic drawings, the variety of weavings draped on the gallery hanging bars was dizzying.
The Nature of Bali Fashion Week ‘08
The theme of this year’s Bali Fashion Week is “Fashion Meets Nature.” I’m not sure what that means in style terms, but be there from 24 to 30 August and find out for yourself. Perhaps bamboo bikinis and pineapple fiber Carmen Miranda tango dresses? Who knows. Anyhow, this is an ideal opportunity to get a fashion foot in the door for the major world fashion weeks that Indonesian designers are sure to invade in years ahead. Make friends now and get a catwalk-side seat in 2012 for the best Indo-designers’ shows in Paris and Milano.
Best Photog Blog in Bali : Rio Helmi
Rio Helmi is one of the most extraordinary characters in Bali. He’s best known as a photographer of culture, travel, buildings and food (sometimes), but there is much more to him than that (as if that wasn’t enough). I wouldn’t be so presumptuous as to describe Rio here, and risk making the poor fellow blush when his RSS feed finds this post. I will instead refer you to his newly established blog, which is a feast of fine content.
Brains + Taste + Restraint = Curated.
I chose to use the word “restraint” here deliberately. Restraint as in “child restraints” or “self restraint.” The concept of restraint is something I sermonise about every day. Good design requires a lot of restraint. There are a tremendous number of wonderful products out there for interiors, from flooring to ceiling light fixtures. But you don’t need to use them all, just because they’re so cool you can’t resist. You must resist. The principles of good design demand it.
I found an interior design studio today that understands restraint. The firm is Curated. They seem to understand restraint in two different ways. They clearly understand restraint in choosing elements to combine in a space. I see a dedication to relevance and appropriateness in their portfolio that is uncommon. They also understand restraint in terms of the designer’s duty to restrain the client when necessary. Good design is not saying “yes” to every whim and watching the total spend spiral skyward (with a smug smile).
It’s All Greek to Me
I love it when I see antique textiles serving as inspiration for new ones. And here is a lovely example: Naxos upholstery fabric by the Pollack Studio in a high-tech cotton blend, woven in Switzerland. The inspiration for this elegant jacquard seems to have been an embroidered pillow cover from the Greek islands dating from the 17th or 18th century. How did I figure that out, you may ask?
While browsing for upholstery fabric for a client I came upon Pollack’s Naxos and remembered a “Textile of the Month” I saw on the Textile Museum’s website about a year ago. The image above shows the old and the new, and that both are very beautiful textiles.
Ogle Great Gold Online
The Asian Civilisations Museum in Singapore has an impressive collection of ancient ornament from South and Southeast Asia. Early Javanese pieces like this large Sri ring (7th-9th century), are one of the collection’s strengths. Many of the most beautiful gold ornaments exhibited, including this ring, were part of a substantial gift by Mr and Mrs Andy Ng in the late nineties. When I visit Singapore I always make time to visit the museum to ogle the gold.
It’s no longer necessary to visit in person, though. Go to SGCool (Singapore Collections Online), where you can browse a large online repository of art and artefacts in the collections of numerous Singapore museums. We love online collections, they are a rich source of inspiration and information.
Image © 2007 National Heritage Board, Singapore
Royal Cremation in Ubud
The royal cremation in Ubud yesterday was the biggest ever, and the best publicised. A media centre was set up for the event, marshalled by Edelman PR Indopacific. I think this must be the first cremation in Bali to have its own publicists and press office. And its own blog, too. The wires picked up the story and images, and the New York Times did a big feature, which I feel is the best piece (for mass consumption) yet written about this event.
Image © 2008 Imp Winartho (detail of original)