Upon learning about Indonesian Artist Lucia Hartini, I came to realize how Art is many a times a reflection of the experiences that the Artist personally went through. Normally, the type of surrounding or family one grows up in determines what sort of person he or she is going to grow up to be. Similarly, Lucia Hartini experiences of gender marginalization that is much prevalent in the Indonesian society she lives in motivated her to oppose such social-political conditions in Indonesia by creating Art related to discrimination of the female gender, such as herself. To Hartini, her art is a way of expressing herself, her ideas, and basically what she stands up for in life. On the other hand, it is also a medium for her to relief her stress, boredom, longings and dissapointments in life. Therefore, in simple terms, art serves two simple purposes to her: 1) Raise awareness and provoke thinking amongst people on Social Issues. 2) Fulfill her own artistic and emotional needs.
Linking back to my own experiences of doing art, I sometimes feel uninspired to create an art piece, from sketching a simple apple to creating a great painting. I think that this is perhaps due my life being too smooth or monotonous. Living in a safe and secure society in Singapore, it is truly seldom that we experience great social problems such as racial discrimination, gender discrimination and such. Therefore, the lack of changes and turns in life could be the reason why we do feel uninspired to do Art at times since we do not have a "spark" to begin with.
However, I believe this cannot be an excuse for us to justify why we cannot produce great works of art. We should try to be more sensitive to the beauty in our surroundings and search for our own sources of inspiration. I believe, it is only when true inspiration comes, can truthful and great artworks be created.
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