DOWN DOWN DOWN the rabbit hole at ROH Projects is the fourth solo exhibition by Bandung-based
artist Cinanti
Astria Johansjah (who is better-known as Keni; Balikpapan, 1985;
cinantiastria.com). And for this exhibition Keni decided to deal with a solemn
theme: grief.
In psychology, grieving is described as a five-stage process: denial, anger, bargaining, depression
and, finally, acceptance – the so-called Kübler-Ross model. Keni’s work in
this exhibition is situated in between the two stages of bargaining and early depression.
And the stage of bargaining is considered to be a bargaining with one self, and
one’s anger issues, and one’s surrounding. And in the early stage of depression
there is still hope that the depression doesn’t run too deep and too long, and
thus there is still hope that one could get out of the black void any time soon.
In-betweenness is a significant motif throughout Keni’s oeuvre. She
considers the in-betweenness as an essential ‘adempauze’. ‘Adempauze’ is a
Dutch-Indonesian word signifying an ephemeral respite, eerily frozen in time
for a brief moment. In the context of this show, ‘adempauze’ also refers to the
in-between lulls of grief coming and going in overwhelming waves (thus
complicating the linearity of the psychological model).
Download the e-catalog here.
4 April – 2 May 2017
Artist talk: 18 April at 6pm
– Roy Voragen, curator
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