ART & ABOUT: Suggestive, not explicit

BEFORE you throw away that analogue camera, spare a thought for those who still find their pleasure in the darkroom.

Even now, there are new converts to this inconvenient, expensive, smelly and, above all, dark environment.

It is a curious human feature that the easier things get, the greater the certainty that some individuals will take the harder path. Enjoying its last day today is one of these defiant displays of the human spirit.

With the title Black & White Fest, expectations will vary. Is it going to be photographs, whisky tasting, or a minstrel show? In fact, it’s a three-in-one festival that makes full use of the ambiguities in the title.

Yes, there is black-and-white photography, a personal favourite and still the least exposed art medium in Malaysia, apart from sculpture.

There are also (monochrome) posters by Amir Muhammad and Liza Manshoor that pay homage to the early days of Malayan-Malaysian cinema and the sultry ways of Siput Serawak (her daughter Anita opted for a different spelling).

The rest of the space is filled by something called “Constitutional

Amendments”. This seems to be attracting a lot of interest, judging by the stickers that visitors are encouraged to apply to this stately manifestation of Malaysian law. Being fluorescent green, the stickers stand out more than anything else.

Needless to say, all this innovation is happening at Central Market’s Annexe Gallery. Has KL ever had an art venue with such energy and originality? Or with so many exhibitions? It’s reminiscent of the politicians who have worked so tirelessly to ensure the Constitution is sufficiently amended to keep it truly up to date.

It’s a bonus to find something like “Constitutional Amendments” staring out at you in black and white. It makes a fine installation, as well as being useful for anyone who wants to see how the legal system has evolved.

Hard work for the lawmakers, no doubt, but not as appealing to look at as the laborious efforts of darkroom printing.

In the gallery space next door, the old ways are being adhered to, even by photographers so immersed in the digital-photo tradition that the darkroom is truly a place of mystery.

For earlier generations it was somewhere quiet to go for an illicit smoke. Nowadays it is the whole tactile experience that is popular.

There is also the sense of challenge. As Erna Dyanty, one of the participants in the photo exhibition explains: “With digital, it is easier, in terms of time management, to re-create an image. However, with film I am only allowed a number of rolls to work with and there is no room for mistakes.”

Erna has gone on to create a series of prints that are quite different from the slick digital products made for other exhibitions, including a show at Valentine Willie Fine Art a few months ago. Her Family Memory series puts the tonal possibilities of silver gelatin prints to the contemporary test.

Similarly current is her neighbour on that stretch of wall, Caecar [sic] Chong, whose work has the beguiling title Colours. This is photography of the avant-garde, using varnish to bring out the barely detectable Chinese characters on the surface of the prints.

At the other end of the monochrome spectrum are works by Lim Hock Seng. This photographer made his name with sinks and lettuce, but has now moved on to canals.

Shot in England, these are not grimy thoroughfares of the Industrial Revolution. Instead they are the living embodiment of green and pleasant Agatha Christie-land. They are so idyllic, I looked hard trying to find bodies floating in the water, but there weren’t any.

One photo shows a public lavatory, not usually the high point of a UK holiday, although this pristine facility is a huge improvement on the one that features in Ewan McGregor’s Scottish epic Trainspotting.

Other accomplished practitioners of the darkroom arts include Alan Ng, who gives us forests; and where would silver-gelatin photography be without Alex Moh?

Nature is his subject this time, executed with his usual faultless composition and printing techniques.

Her photos are sharp, but the boundaries are blurred with the work of Bernice Chauly. These pictures with a transvestite flavour have been used on the exhibition’s promotional material, which is a bit misleading.

This is not an exhibition filled with big messages about the human condition. The photos don’t aim to shock. The constitutional amendments are presumably there to do that instead.

One photographer, Azril Ismail, does attempt to conquer a significant barrier to freedom of expression. He has moved on from his haunting images of a depopulated Pudu Jail — exhibited at the Wei-Ling Gallery in May — to something more people-based. The title Triangle in connection with unclothed women will get the imagination racing, but the work is more suggestive than explicit.

Still, it’s a rare and welcome sight and comes as a huge relief after an altogether different encounter many years ago at an exhibition of works by celebrity image-maker Herb Ritts. The photo of David Coulthard doing unclad calisthenics never became the F1 champion’s Tag Heuer “What Are You Made Of?” moment.



* Black & White Fest, Annexe Gallery, Central Market ends Oct 5.



** Lucien de Guise is curator of the Islamic Arts Museum Malaysia. You may write to him at luciendeguise@yahoo.com