Timur Merah Project XIV: Tribe of Fire is a series of cowhide works that explores the role of fire in Balinese cosmology. Here, Sasmita references the Ring of Fire, a string of volcanic and seismic activity that connects islands in the broader Pacific, recounting how natural phenomena such as earthquakes or volcanic eruptions have given birth to various kinds of rituals and mythology around fire as a sacred, purifying energy, rather than only a fear-inducing phenomenon to be escaped from. Drawing upon the themes of rebirth, resilience, and resistance, this work highlights fire’s transformative and purifying powers in rites from birth to death, while celebrating the role of women as spiritual mediators and key figures in maintaining cultural and cosmological balance.

Across these works, Sasmita’s practice bridges cosmology, ritual, and contemporary feminism, speaking to art’s capacity to touch the divine, carry ancestral memory, and resonate viscerally—what Balinese philosophy describes as taksu: the spiritual charisma or energy that animates a work of art.

Cowhide-

The use of cowhide is deeply significant within Balinese Hindu cosmology. Cowhides are considered sacred materials and are often positioned within the outer mandala spaces of temples, functioning as transitional surfaces between spiritual and earthly realms. Sometimes described as the “red carpet for the gods,” cowhide becomes understood as a sacred threshold - the first point of contact as divine beings descend to earth. Within this context, the material is not simply a surface upon which images are placed, but an active spiritual space carrying ideas of transformation, protection, and passage between worlds.

Fire -

Her engagement with fire is as an elemental force, drawing from Balinese ritual practices. . Fire occupies a paradoxical space within mythology and feminist thought: simultaneously destructive and generative, dissolving existing forms while creating conditions for renewal. Within cosmologies surrounding Kali and other feminine archetypes, destruction is not the opposite of creation but often a necessary precursor to transformation, where old structures, hierarchies, and illusions must first be burned away to make space for new worlds. Fire is destructive and productive/ a renewal.

Fire also carries associations of purification—not as cleansing, but as a process of passing through transformation, where materials, bodies, and identities emerge altered. As a wild and uncontrollable force, fire becomes a potent metaphor for feminine agency, desire, rage, and power, particularly given how societies have historically feared women through the language of excess and uncontrollability. Yet paradoxically, women have long been tasked with domesticating fire through cooking, ritual, and care work, becoming custodians of transforming raw matter into nourishment and culture. This tension between wildness and containment creates a powerful symbolic framework where domestic labour itself may be understood as a form of quiet, transformative power.

Multiple Selves (Heads)

The multiple heads recurring throughout these works suggest being aware of multiple selves to take care of. Within Hindu and Buddhist philosophies, existence is relational and one must care for many selves simultaneously: the self in relation to nature, the self in relation to higher beings and spiritual realms, and the self in relation to others and community. The convergence of these heads creates moments that resemble intersections or cruciform structures, where multiple pathways of existence overlap. Their root-like formations may also recall Hindu-Buddhist cosmologies where multiplicity, transformation,and interconnected existence remain inseparable.

Beads-

1) The Beading further extends these ideas of memory and mapping. The beads follow the natural organic creases of the cowhide, tracing wrinkles, folds, and imperfections. In doing so, the works propose ageing not as something to conceal, but as something beautiful—where marks, scars, and wrinkles become records of experience and survival.

2) The beading also becomes a feminist act of re-mapping. Many contemporary trade routes and geopolitical systems continue to follow pathways scripted by colonial histories. By instead tracing the body of the hide itself rather than imposed borders or cartographic lines, Sasmita proposes a more organic form of map-making—one shaped by bodies, material memory, lived experience, and interconnected histories rather than systems of extraction and control.

Snakes

Snakes recur in Citra’s works, and they carry multiple meanings throughout Sasmita’s works. They can symbolize transformation and rebirth through the shedding of skin, while also referencing zodiac symbolism, cyclical time, and destiny. Within many spiritual traditions, snakes are understood as creatures that move between worlds—occupying spaces between the human and spiritual realms—and therefore become symbols of transition, liminality, and passage. They also evoke ideas of vitality and knowledge , appearing simultaneously as sacred , regenerative, and wise beings.