esea contemporary partnered with Elgea Balzarie from Jatiwangi art Factory to develop Clayground, a project which raises issues of environmental and agrarian justice across regions.
Traditions of each country are distinctive but also share commonalities. When two traditions are brought together, conversations about togetherness and hope for the future arise. This is evident in the Clayground project (2024) initiated by esea contemporary and Elgea Balzarie from Jatiwangi art Factory.
In preparing Clayground, Balzarie first underwent a two-week residency period accompanied by three public workshops, and then the results were exhibited at esea contemporary for one month in August 2024.
Clayground seeks to address pressing issues of environmental and agrarian justice on a cross-regional level through cultural exchange between Jatiwangi and Manchester.
Platforms for Developing Asian Art and Culture
Before we move on to explore Clayground, let’s get acquainted with the collaborators who have a focus on promoting regional arts and culture. esea contemporary (esea, 1987) is the only not-for-profit arts centre in the UK that presents and promotes artists and art practices that identify with, and are informed by, the cultural backgrounds of East and Southeast Asia (ESEA).
esea now aims to present contemporary art practices from East and Southeast Asian communities and their diasporas through exhibitions, commissions, research, residencies, publishing and public events.
On the other hand, Jatiwangi art Factory (JaF, 2005) is a community that makes contemporary art practice and culture part of the discourse of local life in the rural area of Jatiwangi, Majalengka, West Java.
JaF’s activities always involve the local community and include exhibitions, festivals, residencies and discussions. As the largest roof tile producing region in Southeast Asia, JaF initiated the Kota Terakota (Terracotta City) project which marks the beginning of a new clay culture for Jatiwangi, redesigning the city based on the vision of the community and collective agreement.
As part of JaF, Elgea Bazarie lives and works in Jatiwangi. Balzarie is the director of Lovegood Productions, an organisation dedicated to positive psychology research and promoting mental health among Jatiwangi youth.
Balzarie is also one of the coordinators of Proyek Hutan Kolektif Perhutana, an initiative to reclaim forest land to protect it from industrial development, as well as exploring alternative economic models rooted in traditional cultural practices and ecological knowledge.
Exploring Clay from Different Region
esea facilitated Balzarie at every step of the residency and workshop preparation. Balzarie visited the studio of Manchester-based ceramic artist Sarah Fraser, who had a residency at JaF just before the Covid-19 pandemic, where Fraser explored the way women express and face current challenges through ceramic expressions that draw on the ceramic architectural heritage of Leeds and Jatiwangi.
During this visit, Balzarie was able to understand the variety of materials from Manchester, as well as relate them to her own techniques and understanding of the different properties of clay that will inform her workshops in the region.
The workshop series is titled Clayground: Hear, Touch, Taste. With Balzarie as the host, the workshop highlights artistic practices in the countryside by highlighting Jatiwangi as the largest roof tile production region in Southeast Asia and connecting it to Manchester, the world’s first industrial city.
The workshop introduced the making of clay suling (a Sundanese, West Java, flute commonly made from wood or bamboo) which centred on listening, the making of clay skin masks that focused on touch, and ended with a cooking session that involved taste.
Through this process, esea as facilitator was able to experience organic local daily life, such as by shopping and cooking together. The workshop provided valuable insights through Balzarie’s presentation as well as knowledge exchange and collaborative creation.
Exhibition as a Space for Exchange
After the workshop, esea and Balzarie organised a post-residency exhibition. The exhibition was a celebration that showcased the creations of the workshop participants along with JaF’s original objects. The films shown were Masyarakat Tanah Berbunyi (2018) by Almanoka A. & Kiki Permana from JaF, and Jatiwangi/The Scent of Jati Trees (2018) by George Clark.
The exhibition then makes the idea of “Clayground” as a large-scale shared space that invites visitors to hear, touch and feel clay objects as symbols and representations of Jatiwangi’s local culture, while deepening the understanding of the importance of collective space.
Collaboration is an important aspect of this project. esea states that co-curating is a new mode of working for exhibition programmes and their publics. esea and Balzarie have worked together in designing the exhibition, placing importance on trust and the pace of communication in order to create collegiality not only between individuals or institutions, but also between cultures. Habits such as sharing Indonesian and British snacks during free time are also counted as ways of learning about each other’s cultures.
Community Networking Opportunities
Seeing the importance of post-exhibition sustainability, esea sought opportunities to build networks between rural Indonesia and communities in the UK. esea planned to integrate the results and impact of Clayground into its core programme by ensuring continuity in environmental awareness, cultural exchange, and artistic innovation. “Showcasing material from Jatiwangi art Factory and highlighting their sustainable practices has given UK audiences a valuable insight into environmental practices in Indonesia,” esea reckoned.
esea also sought to continue conversing with George Clark, an artist, writer and curator, who over the past ten years has developed transnational projects that explore new modes of exchange, collaboration and dialogue. In 2018, Clark, along with Ismal Muntaha, Bunga Siagian and Will Rose, initiated the West Java West Yorkshire Cooperative Movement, a collaborative project that seeks to open up creative opportunities between West Java, Indonesia, and West Yorkshire in the UK.
In light of the positive outcomes of the residency, esea is seeking opportunities to organise workshops, joint research projects and interdisciplinary initiatives both face-to-face and online in order to overcome physical and geographical boundaries.
Cultural Exchange as a Transformative Event
Clayground has created ideas and dialogues that may lead to new artistic and curatorial initiatives on a global scale. esea thinks that throughout the project, “we experienced a shared desire for cultural and perspective exchange, motivating us to seek more opportunities to facilitate a platform for conversation between the UK and Indonesia.”
Clayground was a transformative event where cultural exchange was prominent throughout the process, particularly regarding the culture and artistic practices in Jatiwangi.
