Artist Process – Revealing Thought

Maryanto is deeply concerned by the geo-political and environmental issues around Southeash Asia, specifically his home in Indonesia. He creates monochromatic images as paintings, drawings and installations at varying sizes to evoke a dramatic response and call to action from his audience. Themes discussed in Maryanto’s works underly power hierarchies that invisibly determine the physical land and its connection to political, governing rights and allowances.  

Maryanto’s makes many material choices including a common decision to only use black and white, removing any distraction from colour. His process of revealing images through the scraperboard processes takes two forms. As a child, Maryanto was interested in manual photography and discovered a technique of wetting black photographic paper to easily scratch textures, lines and shapes, removing aspects of the picture or creating an entirely new picture from the blackness. In later experimentation, Maryanto makes works on canvas, painting the canvas with thick black gesso and acrylic paint. He then scratches away his intended image which is informed by a reference photograph.  

Maryanto connects this material process to his conceptual and mental process; acknowledging the action of creating something from dark to light and discovering something along with conversations in his mind, talking with himself as he draws.

Think About/Discuss:

In Sand Miner Bivouac Maryanto depicts a landscape in flux. What are some of the events and interventions that have led to this landscape’s current state?  

Discuss the how Maryanto has depicted devastation and destruction in the artwork and similarly how he depicts hope. As a class critically argue what is the strong mood of the piece.  

A suggested activity would be to create a mini Maryanto using premade scraperboard. Each student can research and choose a landscape from their local environment that has been affected positively or negatively by human intervention. This reference image will need to be printed in black and white. Dedicate a lesson to Maryanto’s process of revealing an image from dark to light and encourage students to consciously draw attention to the thoughts and feelings they experience as they create.

• Their thoughts and feelings may be linked to the material process.

• Their thoughts and feelings may be part of processes a personal experience they are currently facing.

• Their thoughts and feelings may be related to the context of the image they are creating.

All are appropriate and should be individual acknowledged as achieving the outcome of the activity