Sculpture by Antonius Kho at Alila Ubud Gallery,
Desa Melinggih Kelod, Payangan. Tel: 975963.
Currently, the Alila Ubud Gallery is exhibiting a series of
sculptures created by the multi-talented artist Antonius Kho,
who was born in Klaten, Java. Antonius studied at the Institute
of Batik and Craft in Yogyakarta, and the Academy of Fine
Art in Bandung, before enrolling in the Academy of Fine Art
in Cologne, Germany, where he later pursued a career as a
painter. Kho returned to Bali around ten years ago, to found
the Wina Gallery in Ubud.
In his exhibition, ‘Action-The Balance of Life’,
Antonius Kho uses wood to explore particular themes that haunt
him, such as love, fertility, the quest for personal identity,
and, most of all, the ‘balance of life’. Even
though his content and themes are ‘heavy’, many
of the works in his show are witty, filled with visual puns
and comic posturing. They are sculptured in a secular Timor
‘primitive’ naive or even child like style, which
is another side of the artist’s normally serious demeanor.
As a trained painter who began creating wooden works as extensions
of his painting, Kho replaced canvases with several small,
sometimes protruding, wooden squares on which he painted human
faces. In this way, he added a third dimension to his paintings.
This meant that Kho was exploring his differentiations between
painting and sculpture. In his work there is a refined synthesis
of classic sculptural concerns and ideas, such as transformation,
symmetry of shape, ‘significant’ form, gravity,
and serialism, mixed with a strong avant-garde sensibility.
Throughout his works Kho plays with the idea of the ‘transformation’
of natural found material. Kho carves his sculptures from
pieces of wood, following the grain, and the natural curves
and contours of the selected timber. The subjects appear not
to pre-exist but to emerge out of the interaction between
the artist and the medium. After completion of the carving,
as a painter, Kho applies heavy coats of metallic paint. This
paint is an assortment of colors including steel, green and
iridescent blue and red. The result is a metallic ‘artifice’,
which toys with the idea of ‘illusion’ and honest
deceit. This technique adds greatly to the surprising wit
of the works.
The piece ‘Ready’ explores the concept of symmetry
of shape. An athletic runner is depicted in a crouching position
moments before the blast of the starter’s pistol. The
muscular legs, steeply hunched back and tense arms of the
runner create an harmonious, significant sweeping curve, which
is not only pleasing to the eye, but, also conveys the tension
and exhilaration of the sport which the sculpture is depicting.
As the eye traces the symmetrical lines of the runner’s
taunt body, we can appreciate the patterning of muscles and
flesh, but we also enjoy a sense of approaching action and
excitement.
The idea of ‘formal’ relationships and proportions
are explored in the work ‘Balance’. A woman, perhaps
playing with a child, is depicted on ‘all fours’.
Her arms and legs, protruding from the body at acute angles,
echo, compare, contrast and reinforce their similar shapes.
These ‘positive’ and ‘negative’ shapes
create a work that delivers a mood of serenity and reflection,
but, also it results in a pleasing depiction of ‘formal’
controlled sculptural ‘balance’.
Weight, size and gravity are all explored in the work ‘Look
at Me’. Perhaps one of the more amusing works in the
exhibition, a heavy, high spirited, youth stands on the seat
of his flimsy motor-bike. The precarious positioning of the
youth, and his tottering motor-bike, creates a work that is
not only very funny, and, at the same time, a sharp piece
of social observation, but, it also depicts an impending accident.
Thus, the tension intrinsic to this work is achieved by a
strong grasp and use of the principles of balance and gravity.
The notion of seeking geometric forms that underlie the ‘ragged
and tangled’ diversity of natural timber are amusingly
investigated in ‘Earthquake’. Here, a cube, which
resembles a piece of Swiss Cheese, is used to represent, or
symbolize, the violent forces of an earthquake. Protruding
from one of the ‘holes’ are a pair of legs, the
victim having been sucked into the catastrophe. The work,
with its unusual metaphor, is a pleasing piece of surreal
nonsense.
Further, Antonius Kho shows a sculptural concern of treating
his ‘Objects’ as ‘Series’. The works
‘Silent’ and ‘Shy’ are typical, in
that they constantly repeat their sensuous forms, with slight
changes of body position. The use of repetition reinforces
and stresses the traditional themes generally associated with
the representation of the pleasing and symbolic form of the
female sculptured nude. These variations contribute to the
interest of the works.
Finally, Kho demonstrates an interest in ‘Pure’
or ‘Organic’ forms which are pleasing for their
own sake. Within the work ‘Silence’ for instance,
‘the spirit of the mass’, or the form and contours
of the chosen piece of wood, are allowed to dictate the final
shape of the sculpture. This practice of allowing the material
to ‘speak’ to him also results in a collection
of works, such as ‘Smile’, which display a strong
fascination for the accessible symbolism of Timor secular
art. In these ‘primitive’ works, Kho shows that
likeness to nature does not matter. What does matter is that
abstract elements or organic forms, are the means through
which a sense of ultimate reality are conveyed.
This exhibition is clearly the work of an artist who has thoroughly
studied the principles of classic sculptural ideas and concerns.
These concerns are not raw but have been completely absorbed
into his sculpture. However, the message most apparent in
the show is that ‘the balance of life’ is not
to be found in one particular object, but in the accumulation
of a series of apparent trivial emotions and events which
culminate in a serene, harmonious, or ‘balanced’
life. The fact that Kho has been able to observe and depict
these moments with a witty accuracy only adds to the enjoyment
of his exhibition.
