Fyerool Darma
Building on his ongoing Screenshot series, Fyerool proposes an environment for exploring a type of supra-locality – the cultural currency of textiles from the pre-modern to hyper-real. Drawing equally upon illusion and allusion, he interlaces and embroiders found images and texts from digital and other archival sources into a series of objects that oscillate between the realms of the digitally foraged and manually produced. These framed weavings contain dyes transferred by heat onto polymer threads and remnants of textiles, amalgamated with labour and knowledge. They are configured with stock images of songket and video game backgrounds on the wall in a way that is neither naturally picturesque nor logically constrained by the coding guidelines of warp and weft.
The presentation is an exercise in composing oneself and decomposing images to recompose a visual pantun or culturally-modular quatrain in a context of hypervisuality and climate change. Developed in experimental antilinear conversation with art historian and curator Karin Oen, it continues the artist’s exploration of imagery, technologies and temporal hiccups. Its first iteration was presented at the gallery earlier in January 2022, followed by a second iteration in London at Tabula Rasa gallery. Frieze Seoul marks the third iteration and development of Darma’s research around forgotten and obscured Malay history, particularly the Nusantaran culture.
Viewing Room: Facture of the Anti-Grid, in Glitched Syncopation. Text by Dr Karin G. Oen
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