ORDER IN CHAOS: OUTLOOK ON SELF IDENTITY THROUGH THE SIGNIFICANT FORMS OF MINANGKABAU DECORATIVE ART

• Main Author: Adillah Mujahidah, Shofia
• Format: Final Project
• Language: Indonesia
• Online Access: https://digilib.itb.ac.id/gdl/view/80160
• Institution: Institut Teknologi Bandung

This final project work began with the author's interest in understanding personal identity. Despite being raised with a deep respect for traditional culture, urban living caused the author to feel alienated from those values. The author's desire to comprehend personal identity led to the selection of Minangkabau ornamentation as the conceptual foundation for the visual forms to be realized. The author formulated visuals based on the significant forms found in Minangkabau ornamentation. These forms evoke aesthetic feelings within the observer. The creation process is grounded in Clive Bell's theory of significant form within the realm of art, supplemented by the ideas of artists like Kandinsky and the insights of Susanne Langer. The artistic process began by creating modules as the basic motifs for repetitive forms, then selecting directions and modifying shapes based on fractal principles and grid methods. Both understandings also assisted the author in composing visual works that play with the density and spacing of forms. The author crafted the work by making marks, drawing lines, and stacking modules obtained. The author utilized color values to harmonize the work. Watercolor was chosen as the drawing medium for its transparent nature, allowing for layering strokes to achieve the desired darkness of values. The result is a collection of geometric shapes that structurally interact, cross, and intersect. Each encounter produces a new form in the obtained visuals. In the end, the series "Silih Menyilih" is the outcome of the author's process of understanding the dynamics of personal identity. With this work, the author attempts to convey visually what was discovered from the pieces of shapes, then presented back to the observers.