1. Could you tell us a bit about how Art Jakarta was founded and its journey? Has the fair’s mission and objectives changed or evolved since it first started?  

Tom Tandio: Art Jakarta started as a fair by MRA Group to promote their magazine, which is called Harper’s Bazaar. That’s why it was called Bazaar Art Jakarta, it was one of the magazine’s activation events. So, it started off as Bazaar Art Jakarta and for the first 10 years it had been held at the Ritz Carlton Hotel Ballroom in Jakarta.  

In 2018, after a decade of journey, they decided to find a new team and a new business partner, which was myself, and then we set up a new team to rebrand and reposition the fair. What we did was we brought the fair to the Jakarta Convention Center (JCC), a complex of international convention halls near the city’s business district, so that it would look more proper as an international art fair.

At the same time, we improved the composition of the contents of the galleries. We had at that time 40% non-Indonesian galleries and 60% Indonesian ones. Further changes took place during the COVID years when we created Art Jakarta Virtual to showcase artists’ works in virtual spaces in 2020, and when we initiated Art Jakarta Gardens in 2022 to offer an experience of art in the open. Eventually, in 2023 we moved to JIExpo, in the northern part of Jakarta, and this year is our largest edition yet with 73 galleries. In this very tough time, economically, I think the fair did fairly well in terms of sales. 

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1. Art Jakarta 2024 © Jipanji/Archive of Art Jakarta 

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2. One thing that stood out from this year’s Art Jakarta was how the boundaries of what are being presented are constantly being pushed, in terms of the styles and mediums of works and geographical representation of galleries. What are some of your thoughts on the evolution of the contemporary art scene in Southeast Asia? Where do you see the Southeast Asian art scene going from here? 

Tom Tandio: I think that Southeast Asian contemporary art is getting more and more popular and it has continued to grow, with more and more appreciation from the public towards contemporary art, especially in countries like Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia. You can also see a lot of growth, especially in Thailand, where more institutions have emerged recently, and also more auction houses. All these different additions to the structure of the art communities in Southeast Asia allow more people to appreciate art. And, of course, the market is growing.

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2. Galeri ZEN1's booth presenting Mannerist Manifest, a collaborative piece between Mulyana and Yudi Sulistyo © Jipanji/Archive of Art Jakarta

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3. What was the process of selecting the local and international galleries and artists for the fair this year like? What are some of the biggest shifts you've seen in the collecting art scene, over the past editions of Art Jakarta?

Tom Tandio: I think that, of course, for Art Jakarta, we select our inclusion of galleries very easily because we know the market very well. Most of the galleries that we select are those with good programmes and those which have been frequently talked about in the Indonesian art scene. About the international galleries, we select, of course, some definitely established galleries that do well overseas, but at the same time we also try to show young galleries that have very good and interesting programmes, such as Artspace House, from Gwangju. It’s a young gallery and has very good programmes, and we thought that this kind of gallery fits us very well.

The Back Room from Malaysia is another very interesting gallery that has joined us. We also work with Easelly, which is the second brand of the LEE & BAE gallery. So, we also include some of the young galleries in the region to introduce new artists to the wider Southeast Asian art scene.

The Southeast Asian collecting scene has also been growing because more and more Indonesians collect more and more non-Indonesian works. Indonesian collectors are actually not dictated by a nationalistic flavour, they buy anything they like. But in Indonesia, it’s only at Art Jakarta that you can see so many international artists being shown. Normally, you don't really see many international artists being shown here.

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