The first museum dedicated to Palestinian art in the US opens its doors in Connecticut

The first museum dedicated to Palestinian art in the US opens its doors in Connecticut pic.twitter.com/DB0NiufrpF

— AFP news agency (@AFP) April 28, 2018

2016 begins and ends with music deaths

Yahoo – AFP, December 26, 2016

Fans of British singer David Bowie were stunned by his death on January 10, just
two days after releasing an acclaimed album, "Blackstar" (AFP Photo/FRANCK FIFE)

New York (AFP) - Pop superstar George Michael's death over the Christmas holidays caps one of the most tragic years in memory for the music world which mourned a steady stream of top names.

Here are some of the prominent musicians who died over the momentous year:

-- DAVID BOWIE. The rock icon's fans were stunned by his death on January 10, just two days after releasing an acclaimed album, "Blackstar," on his 69th birthday. Bowie, musically innovative until the end, had been battling cancer but his illness was known to few outside his immediate family.

-- GLENN FREY. The co-founder and frontman of the Eagles died on January 18 at age 67 after years of poor health. With the massive success of tracks such as "Hotel California," the country-tinged rockers were among the best-selling acts in US history.

-- PAUL KANTNER. The co-founder and creative force of Jefferson Airplane, whose psychedelic sound was a soundtrack to the 1960s hippie era, died on January 28 at age 74 after a heart attack.

-- MAURICE WHITE. The founder of Earth, Wind & Fire crafted tight pop songs out of funk, with the band becoming one of the top-selling acts of all time and among the first African American groups to win a wide white audience. The 74-year-old died on February 4 after suffering for years from Parkinson's disease.

-- KEITH EMERSON AND GREG LAKE. Emerson, one of rock's original keyboard stars who infused concerts with on-stage theatrics such as playing upside-down, killed himself in his Los Angeles area home at age 71 on March 11. Bassist and singer Greg Lake, his bandmate in progressive rock trio Emerson, Lake & Palmer, died in London of cancer on December 7 at age 69.

-- PHIFE DAWG: The snide rapper from A Tribe Called Quest, a group that brought a new artistic sensibility to hip-hop, died on March 22 at 45 after a lifelong struggle with diabetes.

-- MERLE HAGGARD. The country music legend, a self-styled outlaw whose music gave voice to disaffected conservatives in the hippie era, died on April 6 on his 79th birthday.

Prince, one of the most influential and successful artists

 of the 1980s, died on April 21 at 57 (AFP Photo/

BERTRAND GUAY)

-- PRINCE. One of the most influential and successful artists of the 1980s, the "Purple Rain" star died on April 21 at 57 at his Paisley Park estate in Minnesota from an accidental overdose of powerful painkillers. Prince, who popularized his own brand of sensual and danceable funk, was prolific in his output but also famously reclusive. With his marathon shows, he had appeared outwardly to be a model of health.

-- LEONARD COHEN. The poet and singer, whose meditations on love and spirituality had won him an impassioned if niche audience, died on November 7 at 82, with his family quietly burying him in his native Montreal before announcing the news. In a parallel to Bowie, Cohen just weeks earlier had released an acclaimed album, ominously entitled "You Want It Darker."

-- SHARON JONES. The fiery soul and funk singer, who rose to fame at a late age and came to be called the female James Brown, died on November 18 of cancer at age 60.

-- RICK PARFITT. The hard-charging, hard-living guitarist from Status Quo died on December 24 at age 68 following an infection.

-- GEORGE MICHAEL. The singer, one of the brightest lights of giddy 1980s pop with the duo Wham! before a more introspective and troubled solo career, died at his home outside London at age 53, apparently on December 25. The "Careless Whisper" singer had numerous health scares and drug-related incidents late in his life.

British singer George Michael, who sold more than 100 million albums in

his career, has died aged 53 (AFP Photo/LEON NEAL)

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"Numerology" (3) - Dec 10 - 11, 2016 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) - New


"THE THREE WINDS" – Feb 23-24, 2013 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Humanity, Home - other side of the veil, Wind of Birth - Birth, Wind of Existence - Life, Wind of Transition - Death) - (Text version)

“… The Human Spiritual System

The puzzle during your life is about how much of this truth of being part of the creator you can accept. How far can you open the quantum door to see this truth when you are alive? This single attribute determines how enlightened you become during life. Listen: It's not how much knowledge and experience in is your Akash, but how much you allow yourself to believe it. There are many old souls on this planet who have an amazing amount of spiritual learning, yet they don't want to touch that "spiritual jar" within them at this point in their lives. This is the free choice of the Human Being we speak about.

There is immense planning that puts you at the Wind of Birth. What did you accomplish during the last lives, if anything? Who were you and what did you do? What energies did you start that were not complete that you wish to continue? What soul group were you in? Who were your parents? Are you in certain soul agreements to become their grandchildren? That is more common than you think! There are so many things that go into the planning of the "entry energy" of your life, and each life potential is different and unique. The planning is done by you when you have "the mind of God" on my side of the veil.

Humans don't like the fact that there is no generic spiritual instruction manual that states, "Here is what happens and here is what to do." Listen, dear ones, humanity is honored way above that! Are all your children the same? Do books on how to raise children always work for your child? The answer is no, because each soul is totally unique. But Humans still wish to have a list of things to do and not to do, as though each soul somehow came out of a spiritual machine that made them all the same. No. Instead, Spirit honors each soul with unique choice and a tremendous variety of energy selections.

The Great Artists

There are certain attributes that Humans receive on the planet, and we'll call them creative attributes. These are almost quantum attributes that may take several lifetimes to complete. What often happens to these creatives is that they go through a series of lifetimes as though it were one in order to have completion of their creative cycle. Famous artists will come back, and the first thing they want to do is pick up a brush and continue what they did before. Famous composers, famous poets and sculptors will come back and simply keep going! It's so obvious, yet you deny this in your scientific way.

So the creatives are different from the others, and their puzzle is to bring the planet the greatest treasures of art through a unified series of lives, yet personally they try to sort out the puzzle of "what they carry inside is valuable, but nobody knows it". If you've noticed, most of the great artists who have even lived and are here today carry a burden that is easily identified as "lack of self-worth". Do you see the set-up? It's ripe for personal discovery, isn't it? So can you see the Human standing in the Wind of Birth, ready to continue what they only began last time? With the "mind of God", there is a smile on their face as they hear the music that they will compose, for it's with them when they arrive.

As you stand at the Wind of Birth, you are completely and totally a unique creature with incomplete energies. It takes more than one short earthly life to create Human attributes that grow into maturity. Even non-creatives (most of you) have a lineage of starting something that never got fully completed. Sometimes it's within relationships. Sometimes it's learning or teachings. Old souls are good at this coming and going and often pick up where they leave off as they slowly change the planet by their very presence upon it. The old soul is, "Sewing the seeds of light on the carpet of linear time, not even knowing that he will also be harvesting those exact mature plants of wisdom as he returns in a subsequent life."

Therefore, dear one, you don't arrive with a blank slate, but you have to know that, don't you? The old soul feels it. The only ones who arrive with a completely blank slate are the newbies [first timers] and we'll talk about that in the next wind. But this is a room of old souls who are hearing and reading right now. Each of you is here with a spiritual jar that is filled with the experience of living on Earth, and sometimes even the attribute of "awakening to your own mastery".  ….”

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10 Amazing Things Kids Have Said About Past Lives

"Common Questions from Non-Lightworkers" - Feb 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Carroll) 

"... Question Three: Is there life on other planets?

... I will tell you, as long as you stay in 3D, you'll still be getting in little metal cans and air suits and going to planets. As soon as you begin the quantum age, however, you will simply wish yourself there, because you will be entangled with everything and can go with intent. If you don't believe this now, you will later, for what I give you is true. It may be lifetimes and lifetimes from now, but the group that is before me is the group that is going to come back over and over. The difference is that you're done coming back in an old energy. This is a new energy..

When you come back, dear one, everything you know will be in your DNA and be on top [available]. You're not going to have to go through what you did before. As soon as you decide to look around and open the door [metaphor for free choice to awaken], everything you've learned this time around will be right there.

This is the attribute of what you would call "a child of new consciousness," which you have labeled with a color - indigo. The child remembers who they are. They are conceptual, and you believe they have to be taught from scratch! Hardly! They remember! Do you understand what is taking place? We told you this last time, but we want to review something with you: The animal on the prairie drops its calf and within hours, the calf is up, running with the herd. Did you know that the calf instantly knows who its enemies are, what water to drink that doesn't smell right, and what berries to eat that are not poison? Where did that come from? How did that infant animal know these things? The answer is that this information was biologically inherited. You call it instinct. But when you have a Human baby - nothing! It doesn't know anything but that it's hungry. It requires 20 years of teaching! Aren't you tired of that? Did you ever think about why the animals have so much knowledge to begin with and you have so little? Does that seem correct for the top of the evolutionary ladder? It's time for that to change.

You're starting to see it, even with the indigos. They come in knowing. That's why they're so impatient. You're trying to teach them things they already know instinctively. Just like the calf on the prairie, they come in knowing. Some of them try to teach you. That doesn't always go well. That was question three...."

"The Quantum Factor" – Apr 10, 2011 (Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) (Subjects: Galaxies, Universe, Intelligent design, Benevolent design, Aliens, Nikola Tesla (Quantum energy), Inter-Planetary Travel, DNA, Genes, Stem Cells, Cells, Rejuvenation, Shift of Human Consciousness, Spontaneous Remission, Religion, Dictators, Africa, China, Nuclear Power, Sustainable Development, Animals, Global Unity.. etc.) - (Text Version)

"..... DNA - A Quantum Force 

Now we get to the core truth, don't we? So I will tell you. The ninety percent of DNA which is quantum, is filled with information, both esoteric and timeless. It is a quantum blueprint for everything you are and have been since you arrived on the planet the first time. DNA contains instruction sets for your life; everything from your full Akashic Record - every single lifetime you have had - to the benevolent creator's fingerprint within the seeds of creation itself. Every single talent you ever had is there, even if you don't have any of those today... the record is there. Every predisposition of weakness and strength are there. Biologically, every single instruction to every single stem cell is there. . ..."

"..... DNA is a Dynamic Molecule, not a static one.

Humanity is stuck in the 3D portion of their biological thinking. In your 3-D life, you simply accept the chemistry you're given. You act as though the three percent gene producing part is all there is. You believe it is a chemical protocol that is unchangeable and simply "you." You don't see it for the way it's designed. It's dynamic and always has been. It's not set, but will continue to simply repeat what it does unless there is another quantum influence on it.

Therefore you live with the 3 percent as though it were all there is, and since it just "came with your body" and seems to control everything, you never talk to it. Many of you come in with pre-dispositions based upon the karma which is put upon you from your past lives. You don't come in clean [without karmic energy]. Instead, you arrive with pre-dispositions, fears and phobias. Some are positive. Perhaps you come in as a prodigy continuing your last life... the 8-year-old who can paint like a master and do brushstrokes that take 30 years to develop. What does that tell you about what must be in the DNA?

Perhaps you come in as the composer, the pianist, the prodigy, the violinist, just waiting until your hands can go on the fingerboard or can reach up and fret the notes. Perhaps you come in knowing how to play the piano, just waiting for your hands to get big enough to do what you used to do... without any lessons. How do you explain that, dear ones? The answer is that all this is contained in the dynamic quantum instruction sets of your DNA... the part you never talk to it. .."

Free Tours Offered at State Palace Art Exhibition to Attract Visitors

Jakarta Globe, Eko Prasetyo, August 04, 2016

Visitors admire a painting by famous Indonesian artist Raden Saleh titled 'The
Capture of Prince Diponegoro, 1857,' which is currently on display as part of the
State Palace Art Exhibition at the National Gallery in Jakarta. The exhibition
titled '17/71: Goresan Juang Kemerdekaan' ('Painting the Struggles of
Independence') is open to the public during August. (Antara Photo/Dodo Karundeng)

Jakarta. The State Palace Art Exhibition organizing committee will provide a series of guided tours for visitors in order to provide more detailed information on the artworks included in this year's exhibit, titled "17|71: Goresan Juang Kemerdekaan" ("Painting the Struggles of Independence").

According to a State Palace statement, tours are scheduled for every Sunday during August, free of charge, at the National Gallery in Jakarta, where the exhibition is currently taking place.

Visitors will be guided by a curator accompanied by experts, including historian Peter Carey, journalist Aryo Wisanggeni, National Gallery director Tubagus Andre Sukmana, Jakarta Art Institute lecturer Citra Smara Dewi and prominent art critic Agus Dermawan.

The official 90-minute tour will take place during two sessions at 10.00 a.m. and 13.30 p.m., respectively. Visitors are expected to arrive on time and follow all regulations.

The subjects to be presented each week are as follows:

Week 1 – Aug. 7: Why did Soekarno collect artworks?

Week 2 – Aug. 14: State Palace policies on artwork collections and exhibitions.

Week 3 – Aug. 21: Themes, styles and types of artworks collected by the State Palace.

Week 4 – Aug. 28: Inventory, catalogues, conservation and publicizing of exhibitions, book publishing, as well as legal aspects.

During each tour, visitors will also be shown rare books collected by former President Soekarno.

Indonesian tattooists revive tribal traditions

Yahoo – AFP, Suryo Wibowo, with Sam Reeves in Jakarta, January 5, 2016

Ranu Khodir, a celebrated Jakarta tattoo artist who uses the traditional
 'hand-tapping' method, displays his Dayak tribe motif tattoo at the Bau Tanah
tattoo museum in Jakarta (AFP Photo/Romeo Gacad)

Men in tribal dress stand amid dense jungle on the Indonesian island of Java, their bodies covered in elaborate, traditional tattoos inspired by cultures in distant corners of the vast, tropical archipelago.

Many images on display at the recent tattoo festival that brought the men together were not applied with fast, modern machines, but using a centuries-old, tribal method that involves artists gently tapping a stick mounted with a needle on a subject's skin.

The practice known as "hand-tapping" had almost faded out completely, as modernity overwhelmed Indonesia's tribes and younger generations eschewed their ancestors' ways, but tattoo artists have in recent years been driving a revival as more and more people seek to reconnect with the past.

Esmat Sakulok shows off his body tattoo design from the Mentawai tribe origin 

during a traditional tattoo festival in the village of Maguwoharjo in Yogyakarta 

(AFP Photo/Suryo Wibowo)

"There is a growing trend now, there are more people who want to learn about traditional tattooing -- I am very happy about it," said Herpianto Hendra, a tattoo artist who uses the ancient method and is a member of Borneo's Dayak tribespeople.

"I am proud that my culture is being recognised."

The body art ranges from flowers inspired by Dayak tattoos that mark the coming of age, to narrow, black lines running across the body, like those of indigenous peoples from a remote scattering of islands in western Indonesia.

The festival earlier this month in Maguwoharjo village in Java's cultural heartland gathered people from across Indonesia and the world at the studio of celebrated Indonesian tattoo artist Durga, a leading figure in the revival.

A tattoo artist uses the traditional "hand tapping" method during a tattoo festival

in the village of Maguwoharjo located in Yogyakarta (AFP Photo/Suryo Wibowo)

Durga has championed tattoos from the western Mentawai islands, home to a semi-nomadic tribespeople famed for their body art and the practice of sharpening their teeth, which they believe makes them more beautiful.

Close links to nature

Mentawai tattoos, generally long lines looping over the shoulders and chest and more elaborate patterns on feet and hands, were long part of local culture and signified the tribespeople's close links to nature.

The other well known body art from Indonesia is found among the Dayaks, an array of semi-nomadic tribes who traditionally lived in the jungles and mountains of vast, biodiverse Borneo island shared between Indonesia, Malaysia and Brunei.

Their tattoos featured thick, black lines forming images inspired by nature, such as flowers, leaves and animals, that mark a person's journey through life. Before head-hunting was banned, Dayaks also received tattoos on their hands if they decapitated an enemy.

Australian filmmaker and tattoo artist Rob Henry, sporting body tattoo designs

 from the Mentawai tribe origin, walks in the jungle where a traditional tattoo

 festival is being held in the village of Maguwoharjo in Yogyakarta (AFP 

Photo/Suryo Wibowo)

While not as well known, other indigenous groups also have tattooing traditions, such as those in the eastern Maluku Islands and the central island of Sumba.

But the tradition has been waning for decades, after Christian missionaries and the Indonesian government sought to discourage what they saw as outdated, tribal practices, and as younger tribespeople moved away from villages to rapidly growing cities in search of better jobs and education.

The revival has been driven by a small group of contemporary tattoo artists, some who have learnt "hand-tapping" methods from local tribes and have put a modern twist on ancient designs -- increasingly popular among the young and hip living in Indonesian cities and abroad.

Lars Krutak, an American tattoo anthropologist, said people are drawn to ancient Indonesian designs as they are "unique, beautiful and deeply spiritual".

"People living in big cities want to be rooted to something meaningful, especially if they plan to wear these tattoos on their bodies for the rest of their lives," said Krutak, who has written an entry on Durga for the "World Atlas of Tattoo", which features 100 tattoo artists.

Australian traditional tattoo artist, Brent McCown uses the "hand tapping" method 

at a traditional tattoo festival in the village of Maguwoharjo located in Yogyakarta 

(AFP Photo/Suryo Wibowo)

'Defend traditional culture'

In the capital Jakarta, a small museum dedicated to indigenous body art has opened, housed in a ramshackle building filled with tribal paraphernalia and photos of tattooed indigenous people.

"Hand-tapping" regularly takes place at the museum, whose name "Bau Tanah" refers to the musty smell that emanates from the earth after heavy rains.

At a recent "hand-tapping" session, tattoo artist Ranu Khodir knelt down and applied the image of a dragon in Dayak style on the stomach of Saman, a motorbike taxi driver, who like many Indonesians goes by one name.

Indonesia Strengthens Outreach to Pacific Isles

Jakarta Globe, Apr 20, 2015

Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi speaking at the opening of the Asian-African
Conference in Jakarta on Monday. (Antara Photo/Sigid Kurniawan)

Jakarta. Indonesia is pushing for more cooperation with Pacific island countries at the Asian-African Conference in Jakarta this week by helping countries in the region through a multitude of means.

Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno L.P. Marsudi met on Sunday with seven of her counterparts for separate talks on the sidelines of the conference, four of them from Pacific island nations.

Vanuatu’s foreign minister, Meltek Sato Kilman Livtunvanu, said his country considered Indonesia to be “the gateway to Asia” and was looking for greater cooperation with Southeast Asia’s biggest economy in trade, agriculture, tourism, and disaster mitigation capabilities.

In early April, the Indonesian government sent $2 million worth of aid to Vanuatu after a devastating cyclone hit the country and left more than a dozen people dead and thousands homeless.

Kilman said Vanuatu was also preparing to open an embassy in Jakarta in a bid to enhance bilateral relations.

“Vanuatu has a great diplomatic relationship with Indonesia. Therefore, Vanuatu hopes to have its embassy in Jakarta,” he said as quoted by state news agency Antara.

“Indonesia and Vanuatu will also be able to experience stronger bilateral relations in the future and be able to discuss various global issues together,” Kilman added.

Vanuatu is among the more than 80 nations that have sent delegates to Indonesia for the Asian-African Conference this week, taking place in Jakarta and Bandung through Friday.

Retno said the Indonesian government welcomes Vanuatu’s plan.

“We are very excited and proud of Vanuatu’s decision to open an embassy in Jakarta. This means that almost all countries of the Pacific will have an embassy here,” she said.

She added that both countries were committed to discussing the technicalities of establishing resident embassies and opportunities for partnership in other sectors.

“We have talked about boosting partnership in the economic, engineering and agricultural sectors, where we already have very good cooperation with Vanuatu,” Retno said.

The minister also expressed her optimism about where relations were going between Indonesia and other Melanesian countries in the Pacific.

Melanesia extends from Fiji to the Arafura Sea and is commonly thought to include Fiji, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, New Caledonia, Papua New Guinea, West Papua and the Maluku islands. The latter two are part of Indonesia.

“Indonesia’s Melanesians are about to become larger than other groups of Melanesians. So I tell you this: Indonesia is Melanesia and Melanesia is Indonesia,” Retno said, as quoted by CNN Indonesia.

Retno also met with her counterpart from the Solomon Islands, Milner Tozaka; Fiji’s Ratu Inoke Kubuabola; and Papua New Guinean Foreign Minister Rimbink Pato.

Pato and Retno discussed increasing trade between the two neighbors. The countries will stage a joint ministerial committee in September to discuss cooperation in a number of areas from sports, education, energy and mineral resources to telecommunications.

Papua New Guinea, Retno said, is also interested in learning more about Indonesia’s recent plans to boost its fisheries and maritime sector. She said several Indonesian companies were interested in investing or expanding their operations in Papua New Guinea.

Solomon Islands Foreign Minister Tozaka said his country was looking to send more students to study in Indonesia.

“We have several cooperation [agreements] in agriculture and education. We have several students studying here and we are aiming at increasing [their numbers],” he said as quoted by Antara.

Retno said that to further strengthen ties with Melanesian countries, Indonesia was looking to host a festival on Melanesian art and culture in October in Kupang, East Nusa Tenggara.

“Through cultural and arts events like this, we can establish more people-to-people contacts,” she said.

Retno also met with South Africa’s foreign minister, Maite Nkoana-Mashabane; Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim Al-Jaafari; and Nepal Foreign Minister Mahendra Bahadur Pandey.

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Old Techniques, New Results on Display at Jeroen Hermkens Exhibition

Jakarta Globe, Sylviana Hamdani, Feb 03, 2015

The exhibition is Hermkens’ second in Jakarta, after holding an earlier one last
March. A collection of the artist’s lithographs and paintings are hosted by Erasmus
Huis. (JG Photos/Sylviana Hamdani)

It was drizzling heavily in Jakarta that Saturday. The capital’s usually proud skyscrapers seemingly bowed down in pensive retrospection. The city that never sleeps was blanketed with a morose, gray mood.

But the main exhibition hall of the Erasmus Huis Jakarta was lit with color. Its whitewashed walls displayed vibrant lithographs and paintings by renowned Dutch artist Jeroen Hermkens.

“He’s a very great artist,” said Erasmus Huis Jakarta director, Ton van Zeeland, at the opening. “He’s already well-known in Holland. I’m very proud that he’s taken the opportunity to be here.”

Hermkens is best known for his cityscapes and expressionistic paintings. Over the years, the 54-year-old artist has produced an immense collection of lithographs and paintings of cities all over the world.

Last week was the second time Hermkens has visited Jakarta.

In March last year, Hermkens presented a series of his works in an exhibition at the Erasmus Huis Jakarta.

This year, Hermkens has returned to Jakarta to present 13 of his lithographs and 11 of his oil paintings in another exhibition at the Dutch cultural center.

The exhibition runs until Feb. 20.

In the current exhibition, Hermkens presents beautiful paintings and lithographs of Dutch and Indonesian cities.

“[The exhibition] is a combination between [paintings and lithographs featuring] Holland and Indonesia,” said the artist.

In the quiet exhibition hall, Hermkens’ lithographs and paintings seem to scream with their bold colors and unique disproportions.

Buildings, leaning and blown out of proportion, seem to tower over the cities. Crisscrossing ropes and cables in the paintings are like veins gushing lifeblood to his artworks.

“Wherever I go, I always have my sketchbook [with me],” said Hermkens. “I just walk around. And watch. And sometimes, I just sit there and draw. [The process] is quite spontaneous.”

The artist uses a reed pen and Indian ink to make his sketches.

He then brings these black-and-white sketches to his atelier in Utrecht to ponder.

“I walk around them for a few weeks to let them work on me,” he said. “The images and memories come back naturally.”

He has made some of his sketches into a series of lithographs and some into oil paintings.

Hermkens uses the old technique of lithography with crayons and grease-based ink on limestones.

The process is so tedious and complicated it sometimes takes four to six weeks for him to complete a lithograph.

“It’s quite a lot of hard work, but what else do I do all day?” Hermkens said, with a laugh. “I think the colors [that the process creates] are beautiful.”

According to Hermkens, he has always loved working with his hands since childhood. After finishing high school, he continued his study at the Art Academy in Utrecht and Atelier Champfleury in Paris.

Hermkens presents the beautiful streets, rivers and landmarks of a number of Dutch cities, including Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Utrecht. In his paintings, these cities are seemingly deserted and dominated with beautiful buildings and statues.

Hermkens’ artworks on Jakarta, on the other hand, feature people, walking or riding motorbikes in between the buildings.

“Usually, I leave my cityscapes empty,” said the winner of the ‘Dutch Artist of the Year’ in 2006. “But for the first time, I couldn’t avoid people in my paintings [of Jakarta].”

Among his beautiful works on Jakarta, the ones that really stand out were the series of oil paintings on bajajs.

In the paintings, the bajajs are standing in groups, waiting for passengers. In between the bajajs are men and women, wearing umbrellas, navigating their ways through the puddles on the street.

“These [paintings] are so romantic,” said Dani Prasetyo, scriptwriter of a television company based in West Jakarta, who came to the opening with his family. “I think they speak of the mastery of the artist, of how he can turn the mundane everyday objects into beautiful subjects of his paintings.”

According to the artist, he did the paintings of the bajajs impromptu, as he was caught in the rain during his first visit in Jakarta last March.

“I was walking in the city and it started raining, so I jumped into a bajaj and he dropped me into a little train station,” he said.

The bajaj dropped the artist at the Gondangdia Station in Central Jakarta, in which he patiently waited the rain to be over.

“I was sitting there for two hours [with] nothing to do and I saw hundreds of people under the pouring rain,” he said. “And that’s why I made the drawings.”

But not all of his paintings are portrayals of real landscapes or events.

In Hermkens painting “Jakarta, Twilight” he depicts the Pasar Baru area in Central Jakarta, with its iconic curved gate, but without its bridge and the river that flows in front of it.

Instead of the bridge, there is a broad street, with people riding motorbikes and pushing carts.

“As I was making it, I took away the bridge and the water under it and [added] a scene from another part of Jakarta,” said the artist. “I think that’s the image of Jakarta in my mind.”

The artist’s way of choosing the subjects of his paintings from the realities around him is what makes his works special.

“I think reality is boring,” said the artist. “And it’s not important. What’s important is what you see and what you feel about it.”

In the exhibition, Hermkens also presents beautiful paintings of the Sunda Kelapa harbour in North Jakarta, which he made in March last year.

“Sunda Kelapa is one of the most beautiful harbors I’ve ever seen,” said Hermkens. “Beautiful large wooden cargo ships with natural curved shapes and their surprising colors. That calls for making a painting.”

In between paintings of ships and buildings, there are also portraits of three beautiful ladies in the exhibition.

“These ladies, living now in Holland, have their roots in Indonesia,” he said.

In the middle of the exhibition hall are glass cases, which showcase the artist’s first sketches of some of the paintings.

“The artist’s highly talented,” said Dian Isniani, a student of Jakarta Art Institute, who came to the opening of the exhibition. “Even his [preliminary] sketches are already outstanding.”

The director of Erasmus Huis Jakarta is very happy with the exhibition.

“Again Mr. Hermkens catches our attention with his interpretations of the capital of Indonesia and other subjects and people,” said Ton van Zeeland.

“I hope the visitors can see other ways of looking to Jakarta by a Dutch artist’s eyes. And I hope they will value the art.”

Dance Troupe Seeks to Revive and Reintroduce Sacred Bali Performance Art

Jakarta Globe, Maya Martini, Dec 14, 2014

Legong dancers during the 20th anniversary celebration of Bengkel Tari
Ayu Bulan. (JG Photo/Maya Martini)

On the last day of November this year, a group of dancers brought a taste of Bali to the bustling capital of Jakarta. Soothing sounds of traditional instruments gamelan filled the room, and candles and flowers gave life to the otherwise gloomy and grey day. It was a performance of Bali’s traditional Legong dance at the Goethe Institute Menteng in Central Jakarta, brought by a group of dancers hoping to revive a dance long forgotten — one that has long survived quietly within the confines of obscurity.

The dance was part of the 20th anniversary celebration of Bengkel Tari Ayu Bulan, a community dedicated to Legong dancers and lovers.

“Legong is a poetry that is rooted from an ancient dance called Gambuh and the sacred trance dance called Sanghyang,” said Bulantrisna Djelantik, also known as Biyan Bulan, founder of Tari Ayu Bulan Bengkel and Studio. Biyan Bulan herself is a distinguished maestro of the Legong dance who has also introduced the dance beyond Indonesia with the help of dancers from Bengkel Tari Ayu Bulan.

“Now, it has become one of the classical Balinese dances with a complex vocabulary of motions full of vibration, alternately bending and breaking, gentle and strong and bound in a frame of rules.” she said.

“Kemilau Legong” consisted of four types of dances, three of which fall under the “non-dramatic” category. The first is a dance named Legong Kupu-kupu Carum, which symbolizes the short and meaningful life of a butterfly. The second, named Legong Kuntir, depicts a scene from the epic Ramayana story, while the third, Legong Kuntul, depicts a flock of a common, slender and white bird called Kuntul. The final dance, which falls under the “dramatic dance” and was choreographed by Biyan Bulan herself, is called Legong Smaradahana – a story of chaos in heaven when evil spirits tormented heavenly being.

“I have seen numerous traditional Bali dances but this one was different” said Hans, a guest at the event said. “The spirit and passion of the dancers could be felt throughout the room, and the atmosphere made me feel like I was transported to Bali.”

Despite having originated in Bali centuries ago, the dance remains unpopular and is rarely seen on stage because its performance is commonly limited to sacred rituals. The dance, which is said to have up to 22 varieties, currently has only 12 preserved varieties.

“The public mainly knows ‘Keraton,’ one variety of the legong dance,” head of the event’s organizing committee Putri Minangsari said. “Bengkel Tari Ayu Bulan aims to reintroduce the uniqueness of Legong to the pulbic, especially to the younger generations to keep it from perishing.”

Bengkel Tari Ayu Bulan today has 22 active Legong dance performers who come from a variety of professions and ethnic groups in Indonesia, all of whom dance with one aim: to preserve the traditional dance and to add color to the local performing arts culture in the process.

Asian cave paintings challenge Europe as cradle of art

Yahoo – AFP, Mariette Le Roux, 8 Oct 2014

This handout picture released by the journal Nature, on October 8, 2014, shows a 

hand stencil found on a cave wall in Maros karsts on the Indonesian island of 

Sulawesi (AFP Photo/Kinez Riza)

The silhouette of a hand on a cave wall in Indonesia is 40,000 years old, showing that Europe was not the birthplace of art as long believed, researchers said on Wednesday.

Created by spraying reddish paint around an open hand pressed against rock, the stencil was made about the same time -- and possibly before -- early humans were leaving artwork on cave walls around Europe that was long thought to be the first in the world.

In the same cave on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, a painting of a pig was dated to about 35,000 years ago, the Indonesian and Australian team reported in the journal Nature.

The discovery, they said, throws up two theories, both of which challenge the conventional wisdom around the history of human artistic expression.

Art either arose independently but simultaneously in different parts of the world -- or was brought by Homo sapiens when he left Africa for a worldwide odyssey.

"Europeans can't exclusively claim to be the first to develop an abstract mind anymore," Anthony Dosseto of Australia's University of Wollongong said in a statement.

"They need to share this, at least, with the early inhabitants of Indonesia."

Anthropologists consider rock art to be an indicator of the onset of abstract thinking -- the ability to reflect on ideas and events.

Recasting human evolution

Dosseto and a team dated 12 hand stencils and two animal likenesses found at seven cave sites on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.

The ancient images were discovered more than 50 years ago, but had never been accurately dated.

This handout picture released by the journal Nature, on October 8, 2014, shows

 hand stencils marking a cave wall in Maros karsts on the Indonesian island of

 Sulawesi (AFP Photo/Kinez Riza)

It had been widely assumed that anything older than 10,000 years would have eroded away in the tropical climate.

The team measured the radioactive decay of trace amounts of uranium found in small stalactite-like calcite growths called "cave popcorn" that had formed a layer less than 10 millimetres (0.38 inches) thick over the art.

The method produced minimum estimates for the works' ages, and the pieces could in fact be much older, said the team.

The stencil is now officially the oldest known specimen of the hand silhouette art form, they reported.

And the depiction of a fat-bellied babirusa "pig deer", its four legs, head, tail and lines of hair still clearly visible, is one of the earliest known depictions of an animal, "if not the earliest".

"It can now be demonstrated that humans were producing rock art about 40,000 years ago at opposite ends of the Pleistocene Eurasian world," the team wrote.

The previous oldest cave art was from El Castillo cave in northern Spain, including a hand stencil dated 37,300 years ago, according to Wil Roebroeks of Leiden University, who wrote a comment on the study.

The oldest known animal painting was of a charcoal rhino in the Chauvet Cave in France, dated to 35,300-38,827 years ago. Traces of red paint about 36,000-41,000 years old were found in Fumane, Italy.

Chris Stringer, a palaeontologist at Britain's Natural History Museum, said the new data suggested that early humans were already artists when they spread out of Africa tens of thousands of years ago.

"I think some of the art in Australia will also eventually be dated to this very early time," he said in a video distributed by Nature.

The findings "stress the great relevance of Asia, and especially southeast Asia, for the study of human evolution," added Roebroeks.

"Compared with Europe, Asia has seen little fieldwork, and new finds will keep on challenging what we think we know about human evolution."

Related Article:

"The Big Picture - You Are Not Alone" - (Message from Kryon channeled by Lee Carroll) - (Text version)

“..  Your Story

Several hundred thousand years ago, Humans began to form into the Human that you recognize today. That's just yesterday. Don't confuse this with Human development. You have had that going on for a very long time. But the DNA that is within your body is not the DNA that developed naturally on the planet. Yours is outside of the system of Earth-based evolutionary processes, and the scientists are starting to see this. The "missing link" that they speak of is not Human.

So again, we tell you that the ones who came to help seed you approximately 100,000 to 200,000 Earth years ago were the Pleiadians who had gone into graduate status and who had changed consciousness. They had become quantum with free choice, and you have parts of their DNA within you.

New information for you: The seeding process was not a one-time event. This is why we give you these large sections of time where the Pleiadians worked with you. It was done over time and in many places. It was not all simultaneous, and this was for reasons that will remain unknown to you for now, but will later explain why you will find other Human types that now are extinct. Now you only have one Human type, and that is counterintuitive to all mammal development on the planet. This was a design, and it took more than 100,000 years to create this for humanity as you know it.

It's your Human bias that has the creation story of the knowledge of light and dark being given to Humans in one day in a garden involving a talking snake and other mythology. Spiritual logic should tell you that these stories are simply metaphors of a real truth, that indeed there was a major shift of consciousness, but over a longer period of time and not instantly. The same mythology has the earth created in seven days. However, this only represents a numerological truth [7 is the number of divinity], meaning that there was a divine design in the creation of the planet. It's time to start using spiritual logic within the teachings you have about spiritual history, for the revelations will be wonderful and lead to fuller understanding.

Now, what really is in your DNA? It's the Pleiadians' code, and it's the ones before them, and even the ones before them. You can't remember it, for that is not the set-up. The system is that your Akashic record is only from Earth, but your "divine remembrance" will take you back to the beginning, where system after system after system created that which you see as the divinity within the galaxy and the Universe.

Who are they? They're your "divine" parents. They're the seed divinity in you and they visit here. They're not all Pleiadians, did you know that? Instead, they're from all over the galaxy. You see, they also represent the seeds of the Pleiadians, and they keep you safe. You wouldn't have it any other way, would you? "Safe from what?" you might ask. ….”

"The Timing of Creation"– Aug  12, 2012 (Kryon Channelling by Lee Caroll) - (Text version)