Art Jakarta Scales Up With New Venue

Syagini Ratna Wulan's Memory Mirror Palace, which showed at the Venice Biennale in 2019, is one of several large installations utilising the extra space.

Indonesia's long-running art fair, Art Jakarta, moves to a new venue from 17 to 19 November.

This year's edition will take place in two halls with a combined 10,000 square metres of exhibition space at Jakarta International Expo (JIEXPO), which was built on the site of the former Kemayoran Airport in Central Jakarta in 2010. The fair was previously held in two halls of the Jakarta Convention Centre with a footprint of around 9,100 square metres.

'We foster a new hope as we move to this larger space which allows us to engage with bigger installation works and more collaborations', said Fair Director Tom Tandio.

A total of 68 exhibitors are taking part, up from 62 last year and approaching the more than 70 galleries that took part prior to the pandemic in 2019. Of these, 40 are Indonesian galleries.

Among the international participants in the fair, ShanghART will present oil paintings by Sun Xun, teasing out the world of his in-development feature-length animation Magic of Atlas, while Whitestone Gallery will present works by Takashi Murakami, Philip Colbert, and Florentijn Hofman, among others.

Alongside its booth presentations Gajah will show paintings by emerging Manila artist Maria Jeona Zoleta for the ASEAN-Korea Innovative Culture Partnership Exhibition booth.

One of the biggest installations that will feature in this year's fair is Syagini Ratna Wulan's Memory Mirror Palace (2023), which stems from the artist's presentation during the 2019 Venice Biennale.

Memory Mirror Palace comprises objects in glass cabinets emblazoned with text. Connections between these objects and texts create a loose contemplative path for the viewer to navigate.

Other special presentations scattered throughout the fair include Park Jihyun's Thomson 6.1944 S 106.8229 (2023)—made from reused domusong blades, other waste and commercial materials—and Jeffi Manzani's mixed media room installation NOC//Turne (2023), which combines data-driven digital visuals with telecommunications waste.—[O]