Asia Art Center is pleased to announce Geometric Variations, an exhibition dedicated to artists known for their bold and iconoclastic abstract paintings. Born and active around the same period of time, Taiwanese artist Chu Weibor (1929-2018), Indonesian artists Fadjar Sidik (1930-2004) and Handrio (1926-2010) were all leading pioneers famed for their innovative approaches and techniques in their time.

Born in 1929 in Nanjing as Chu Wushuen, Chu Weibor retreated to Taiwan with the Republic of China government in 1949 and launched his artistic career that was to span for over six decades by joining renowned painter Liao Chi Chun’s “Yunho Studio”. As a third generation seamster and admirer of Lucio Fontana, founder of Spatialism, Chu Weibor acknowledged and immensely enjoyed the inherent texture and colours of fabrics. His works are constructed by materials with a strong sense of space, whilst the integration of aesthetics based on Chinese artistic spirit, sensibilities, and the free-spirited calligraphy style which are key elements to the “Eastern spirit”, was considered most innovative and unorthodox. As a member of the leading art group Eastern Art Association, which is considered as one of the most significant in the history of Taiwanese art, Chu strived to seek and express the eastern aesthetic and philosophy without limiting himself in terms of medium, techniques or concepts.

This group exhibition showcases Chu’s rarely seen works on glass plates. In these seemingly experimental works the artist applied a wide range of artistic techniques, including collage, painting and print making on the unconventional base of glass plates, creating surfaces which carry various degrees of depth and nuanced colour gradation that are captivating to the eye. Though lesser known than Chu’s famed cut canvases, this body oft works provide a more intimate and insightful glimpse to the artist’s diverse approach to art.

Handrio was born in Purwakarta, Indonesia in 1926. As an avid cello player and music enthusiast, Handrio marked his name in Indonesian art history with the depiction and exploration of the musicality in painting. Taking inspiration from sound and musical instruments, transforming musical notes, chords as well as the forms of musical instruments into abstract shapes and colours into a visual language, the dynamic compositions are highly distinctive among his peers in Yogyakarta. Breaking away from the boundaries what a composition must present, Handrio constructed his paintings out of lattices of lines, arrays of trapeziums and triangles, and splashes of stimulating colours. The criss-crossing of lines on the canvas, the intersecting and application of colour blocks bring together an ensemble of musical notes and rhythms perfectly transformed for visual appreciation.

Handrio distilled landscapes and cityscapes to elemental shapes, which break objects up into seemingly hard fragmented shapes that are actually soft enough to mold and temper into an aesthetical formation that is easy on the eye. Many of his works were left untitled for the audience to independently view and contemplate on, yet the harmonious representation of different tunes and riffs is evident. The composition, be it musical or visual, works because all the elements converge from different directions.

Born in Surabaya, Indonesia in 1930, Fadjar Sidik was an inimitable figure in the development of Indonesian abstract painting, he presented a new aesthetic proposition in the age of urbanisation and industrialisation. Best known for simple compositions that evoke the vibrant pulse and movement of changing nature, Sidik’s works also indicate the profound connections between non-objective painting, textile art, Islamic geometry and design principles, which were rarely addressed by his contemporaries. It is recently announced that Fadjar Sidik’s works will be included in the 60^th edition of the Venice Biennale in 2024, with the aim of highlighting the prominence to modernist movements that emerged in Asia and other continents which are less familiar to the western art world yet are considered as “Historical Nucleus”.

As the political situation intensified in the early 1960s, abstract art was almost absent from Yogyakarta due to its association with western influence and ideological alignment which were frowned upon by the Institute for the People’s Culture (LEKRA) that ran a generous programme of patronage offering artists various kinds of support with the help of the Communist Party of Indonesia (PKI). The only two artists working in such genre being Fadjar Sidik and Handrio, who neither did give way to the pressure of creating politically correct art nor abandon the practice and exhibition of abstract to protect themselves.

Despite the differences in cultural and political backgrounds, the three artists shared the same goal of breaking boundaries in various aspects, in terms of the representation of their ideas, interpretation of their life experiences and the ground-breaking techniques applied in their art.

Through the exhibition of works by Chu Weibor, Fadjar Sidik and Handrio, one is invited to contemplate on the power of the combination of seemingly simple lines and colour blocks which reflect the philosophical, political and musical minds of the artists whose significance in the history of modern abstract art in Asia continue to influence the art community today.