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In the Garden of Summits and Air Hengki Koentjoro’s fine art photography goes far beyond the perfect light and shadow drawings of black and white. A native Indonesian, he summits the peaks of the mountains of Java, where the air grows thin. The images he returns with are wide expanses and atmospheric, dense moments. Koentjoro is… Read more
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IntroductionIn the Garden of Summits and Air
Hengki Koentjoro’s fine art photography goes far beyond the perfect light and shadow drawings of black and white. A native Indonesian, he summits the peaks of the mountains of Java, where the air grows thin. The images he returns with are wide expanses and atmospheric, dense moments. Koentjoro is essentially both an ardent observer and fascinating sculptor of nature. He learned his craft at the Brooks Institute for Photography in Santa Barbara, California. For him, to see and feel nature is both freeing and inspirational. In order to translate a landscape directly into black and white, he lets his imagination run wild, slipping into surprising artistic roles. Thus he looks as if through the eyes of a Buddhist monk across the rainforests of Java from the temple site of Borobudur. Or composes a landscape drama of clouds and mountaintops, in which the spacious depths seems to be skillfully set in relation to concretely represented forms and proximities. The perspectives he employs in his images overwhelm time and again. Clouds and mountain-crests appear so high yet so near, as if the sky plays by different rules in Indonesia. Koentjoro lists Michael Kenna as his greatest role model; like Kenna, he has a fine sense for monochromatic tones and fosters a subject-oriented minimalism. His style thus appears astoundingly certain and rich in form. Shot in a dense, lively atmosphere and exaggerated through a narrative or visual drama, Koentjoro transforms fleeting snapshots of nature into lengthy moments of timeless, natural beauty.
Stephan ReisnerBio
1963 Born in Semarang, Central Java, Indonesia 1977-1981 Canisius High School, New York, USA 1998-2001 Graduated from Brooks Institute of Photography, Santa Barbara, California
Lives and works in Jakarta, Indonesia Awards
2009 Art Limited Winner of the February 2009 contest
Merit award, Indonesian Heritage Society Art And Photography Exhibition
PX3 Honorable Mention Recipients of 2009 Water Competition
2'nd in the Asia Without Borders Photography Competition in the Faces Of The Earth category 2008 2'nd place in Nature Pro category PX3 annual photo competition
Honorable Mentions PX3 Photo Competition
Nominees Black And White Spider Award in Silhouette Category
Merit Award in Single Image Contest Awards, Black And White Magazine Issue Exhibitions
2009 Gallery North Art Space, Jakarta, Indonesia 2009 Heritage Society Art And Photography Exhibition, Indonesia
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