Nanna Tamara 

Currated by Mikke Susanto

An artist’s existence, along with its multi-dimensioned creativity, always gives birth to hope. Because what else is expected from an artist other than for its creativity (and of course, its spirit?) An artist’s creativity can be seen in Nanna Tamara’s works, which were exhibited in Masterpiece Building Jakarta. Concurrent with the spirit of the today’s modern era, Nanna Tamara’s works are manifestation of forms from her mind and her imagination, which gives birth to contemporary arts of today.

Visually, Nanna Tamara’s works employ bright colors such as yellow, blue, light green, pink, and other colors that playfully impersonate light (also generally known as stabilo colors). The color black and white are also utilized as accent. Utilized for its psychological prowess, these bright colors are used intentionally to impersonate the feeling of happiness, happy hour, and good times. Nanna Tamara’s works, through its colors, seem to communicate “It’s me time! Leave me be.”

Lines are also an important element to her works other than colors. The use of black outlines is almost always utilized to border an object, or as an ornament to the object such as hairlines, a flower’s ornament, corals, and the natural world that she created. Thin lines are used as ‘technical tool’ to achieve many impressions effectively, such as creating dimensions and ornamentation. Lines – like those that are present in many decorative paintings – are frequently used to fill in the void. In some of Nanna’s works, the empty spaces are, uniquely, left empty, indicating her openness to the idea of void, and blank spaces.

Nanna’s works often explore the theme of her worlds and spaces, spaces that are boundless and unconfined. Spaces where she can be completely free to explore as she wishes. Her space created worlds that cannot be touched, smelled or sensed by our natural senses. Her worlds often employ opposing elements such as day and night, water and land, consciousness and unconsciousness, as well as fiction and non-fiction.

On Definition of Life (2017), Nanna combined two opposing colors into one. The color of black and white are used using consistent lines, forming subjects of human-like beings with butterfly wings that are flying in the space, and resting on the flowers. This work strengthens Nanna’s mind on her space, and the opposing forces that are frequently present in life.

On Ertinity (2018), we can see her psychological reality. As Nanna Tamara wrote on her portfolio, “When everything is silent, there is a lot of beauty that appear there”, she would like to imply on her experience in facing opposing forces, and the problems in life that most people experience, but rarely understands. Through this work, Nanna wants to communicate the ideas of boundlessness, loneliness, and silence as a sanctuary, a place where she could be happy. The similar ideas of her world could also be found in her Deep Silence (2018) and Everyone Fall Asleep (2018).

Female human-like being with butterfly wings, that resembles the symbol of fairy, and beings that cannot be observed by our natural senses, are representation or alter ego of Nanna’s self. From her 2017-2020 works, such as Definition of Life (2017), Connection with Nature (2018), Enjoyed Every Single Moment I Went Through (2018), When the Sun Goes Down (2018), Be Happy (2020), and Its All a Gift (2018), we can see her individuality, inside the dimensional spaces, that are seemingly chaotic and absurd, yet can be felt deeply. These winged figures, beings that loves the dark and silence world, are present orderly in the conscious dimension, but is chaotic in the unconscious dimension.

Especially, her work titled When the sun goes down (2018) has aspire my imagination and ideas about the autonomous natural world that is beyond what the human’s senses can comprehend. Without the presence of sunlight, the creatures in her works are living together in a cause-effect relationship. Some are giving and serving, and the other are taking and being served. They seem to be active and interacting when most human are asleep. This work conveys that the natural world is never asleep, always happening at all times and is beyond what the limited human senses can comprehend. Whether its self-healing or playing, nature is always happening regardless of human’s destructive and greedy actions towards nature. The sun doesn’t always rises to shine, but also sets to bring changes, healing and goodness.

Concluding all of the points above, Nanna Tamara’s works can be assumed as works that are different from that of most artists. She views canvas as her dialoguing friend, a boundless space, a fictional world that are implemented into an artwork, which are manifested and sensed in by our senses in an orderly fashion. Her works can aspire all beings to bridge all things that are unseen. Thoughts, imagination, idea and technical skills that are possessed by Nanna Tamara are creative manifestations that are important for all of us. For that, we shall also be happy when the sun sets, until the dawn comes echoing again.

Godean – Yogyakarta 25 November 2020