Tintin Wulia
»Everything´s OK«, 2003
Video, colour, sound, 4:51 Min.
Courtesy of Tintin Wulia

September 9 – Oktober 13, 2011

Invited by Katerina Valdivia Bruch (Independent Curator, Berlin)

»Everything´s OK« (2003)

Tintin Wulia (born 1972 in Denpasar, Bali) is an artist, whose work is a reflection about borders in a wider sense. She is interested in the different qualities of borders, such as spatial-geographical borders or cultural-ethnical borders, and its connection to mechanisms of power. Accordingly, she also explores the subject of migration in geopolitical terms. The artist works with objects, such as maps, passports or official family documents. She creates interactive installations that comprise a variety of media, such as videos, murals, texts, objects and performances, and encourages the audience to take active part in them.

In the video »Everything's OK«, the city of Jakarta is presented as a result of uncontrolled growth due to the construction of buildings in an indiscriminated way, without taking into account the problems that this expansion might generate. The work has been created for the OK.Video-Jakarta International Video Festival in 2003.

Using simple hand – made elements, the artist visually recreates the process and the effects of urbanisation that happen not only in Jakarta, but also in a number of cities around the world. Environmental, but also visual and noise pollution are some of the consequences of unregulated migration movements to the cities.

The video is a reflection on a reality in countries with a strong centralised system, in which big cities offer reduced spaces for nature and for living. The ideal of a life in harmony with nature becomes a nightmare of mushrooming cities, where quality of life is seen in terms of money. The title is ironic: a saturated environment full of cars, scyscrapers, large scale advertising, noise and a polluted grey sky is overlapped by new layers of much more of the same, and the process starts all over again.

Tintin's work has been presented in a number of international exhibitions, such as the Istanbul Biennial, Yokohama Triennial, Jakarta Biennale, and currently the 4th Moscow Biennial. Her work has been exhibited at the Museo de Arte Contemporánea de Vigo (MARCO) in Vigo, Espace Culturel Louis Vuitton in Paris, Institute of Contemporary Art London, FACT at Liverpool Biennial, amongst others. She has participated in a number of festivals, such as the Clermont-Ferrand Short Film Festival or the International Film Festival Rotterdam. Currently, Tintin is resident artist of »The Global Contemporary – Art Worlds After 1989« at ZKM in Karlsruhe.

Text: Katerina Valdivia Bruch