Hello Today!
Exposition Nature Days Shot
WTC 3 Lobby, 16 January – 31 March 2023
Photography was introduced in Indonesia around 1841, when the Dutch Ministry of the Colonies had a mission to collect photographic information of the landscapes and people of Indonesia. Almost a century later, the independence of the Indonesian nation triggers photography to introduced and used to a wider public. Photographs begin to take on a life of their own as original works of art when photographers begin to use a creative approach and method. At this point photography is not only a documentation tool, but also a tool for people to share their stories and wild perspective of the object they captured.
In the life of a megapolis, where we are surrounded by a tight schedule, hectic traffic, and a concrete jungle, we rarely get the chance to take a proper break for ourselves. The break must not be a grand escape; it could be only a short breathing moment to rest our mind. This could be done by walking in the park, playing with pets, or just sitting and enjoying the surroundings. Simple things like this are sometimes difficult to do, especially for those of us who work in the middle of the center of Jakarta. In HELLO TODAY! Exposition Nature Days Shot, we invite several artists to show us their perspectives and stories about nature and animals we don’t see that often in megapolis life. Through these, we are hoping to give the passerby a moment of break while enjoying the colorful and serene parts of nature we often miss.
Nico Dharmajungen is an Indonesian maestro of photography. His interest in art and photography led him to investigate all the possibilities that can be achieved with a single shot. He learned the art of photography from Peter Busch in 1969–1970 and studied at the Hamburger Fotoschule in 1970–1971. He subsequently went on to complete his formal study in fine arts and visual communication at the Hamburg-based Hochschule für bildende Künste and Grafikschule Rolf Laute until 1977. In 1976, he started his career in photography as an assistant and then began to work as a freelance photographer in 1981. In the series Flores Vitae, a series that he worked on for over 10 years, he selected a few types of flowers as a representation of different stages and situations in his life. He used those flowers as the basis for his life story, presenting it as an idyllic metaphor.
Just like Nico Dharmajungen, Ted van der Hulst, a Dutch photographer who has lived in Bali for several years, also tells stories through his work. He began taking photographs as a hobby when he was a teenager, and he took the hobby more seriously when he was in his mid-twenties. He attended a vocational photography school in Amsterdam where he honed his skills in portrait and documentary photography. Ted sets himself apart by having a keen eye for a good visual storytelling and producing photographs that often on the cutting edge of truth and despair, focused on people and animals living under oppression. Ted van der Hulst is a photographer who, despite the poetry in his photography, shows an uncomfortable reality and brings us into contact with the essence of life and a longing for liberation from the banal.
With the same spirit as Ted's in exposing reality, Dilla Djalil Daniel, an Indonesian photographer who won the Alfred Fried Photography Award, developed her love for photography when she was nine years old. At that age, she received a camera as a gift so she could take pictures of her dogs. Surrounded by great memories with the dogs, she has grown and become a person who loves animals. As a young girl, she had even dreamed of being a veterinarian. Though it didn't come to reality as she decided to pursue English literature later at the university, she still got the chance to work closely with animals as a photographer, a career that she has built after taking a challenging workshop in Bangkok to really convince her that she had a genuine talent for photography. Dilla has now established herself as an accomplished photographer with a determined commitment to documentary and photojournalistic approaches.
Chaerul Umam is a well-known black-and-white photographer who was born in Malang, East Java. He is notably known for his landscape, architectural, and portrait works. Throughout his career, he has found that black-and-white photographs are the easiest kind of image to digest and admire. He fell in love with the simplicity of the final result and mastered the technique to capture the best shot out of this limitation. Even the simple black-and-white photograph of his, could express the rich emotions of beauty and delicateness incisively and vividly. His artwork alone allows the viewer to experience peacefulness that sometimes come in an absence in our life. It provided us with a dreamlike atmosphere, from our eyes to our hearts.
