Beyond the Modesty, 2002
Installation: carved stones and photographs

It is precisely because the 'konde' is a condensation of the hidden side of Javanese culture that, for over a decade, Nindityo Adipurnomo has laboured to unravel its strands of meaning through his art practice. As an element of Javanese 'official' culture, the konde or women’s decorative hair piece is a metonym for ideals of women’s 'proper place' and erotic sensuality as defined through Javanese male desire. In "Beyond the Modesty," Adipurnomo critically reads his own Javanese male identity across these ideals through various forms of the konde. In this piece, the konde 'masks' the identity of the men represented in the photographs. The stone konde replicas on the floor invite us to participate in Adipurnomo’s process of demystification. However, Adipurnomo argues that this work is not intended to criticize Javanese culture, but rather is his attempt to reveal what lays beyond and behind self-perpetuating myths and cultural stereotypes.
(Text by Amanda Rath)