Lot 67: FX Harsono , b. 1949 Tracing The Past acrylic on canvas

signed, titled Tracing The Past and dated 2008 lower left; signed, titled Tracing the Past and dated 2008 on the reverse/ signed, titled Tracing The Past and dated 2008 lower left; signed, titled Tracing the Past and dated 2008 on the reverse acrylic on canvas

200 by 360cm.; 78¾ by 141¾in. (diptych)

Paintings that speak of history and personal experience often produce strong resonance and compelling visualization. In this exquisite diptych, FX Harsono depicted two corresponding pictorial narratives which appear to flow from one to the other. In the first canvas two identical ladies of Chinese descent pose in "nonya" batik and embroidered kebaya amidst an interior that is filled with a melange of colonial and modern furniture. The composition perfectly illustrates the elements of modern "Peranakan" heritage: a unique synthesis of Indo-European, Chinese and Indonesian cultures. Smiling faces in the foreground provide a dramatic contrast to the expressions of sorrow, fear and anger that are reflected in the background mirror - as if showing memories of a bygone era. They allude to the perception that past and private anguish must be hidden behind public smiles. An empty chair and faint traces of the female figures fading into the past occupy the second canvas. In their place are enormous yellow butterflies; their wings flutter while their bodies are impaled by giant needles, depicting a scene that is both mysterious and sublime. The artist often associates butterflies with the ephemeral quality and fragility of life, and sharp needles with mankind's ability to cause pain and violence. Being Peranakan and growing up in an era marked with racial delineation for Indonesians of Chinese-descent, Harsono recollects well the emotional burden of his ancestry and the injustices of the 1998 riots. Tracing the Past is a powerful, refined, personal and poignant tour-de-force of how art chronicles the passage of history and carries the echo of the past into the future.