Book & The Arts

Some of our society might be proud when Barrack Obama were appointed to be the President of United State. Well, this is a natural since the Kenyan-American guy used to live in Indonesia for four years. The welcoming event of Obama's arrival was designed in spectacular way. Damien Dematra, a novelist, painter, and movie director looked busy in preparing the "Celebrating Obama's Homecoming' program when heard that Obama plans to come to Indonesia.

So, no wonder in the Celebrating Obama's Homecoming program he write novel, painting exhibition, and creating movie tells about Barack Obama.

And, in the last Wednesday, Damian held painting exhibition entitled "Obama Anak Menteng" (OAM) - [Obama the Kid of Menteng] in Ballroom Lobby of Dharmawangsa Square 3rd Floor, Jakarta.

According to Damian, the idea in conducting the exhibition showed up whne he was invited to have dinner in U.S embassy, when he was asked by his friend about the future program. "The idea is to carry out a painting exhibition was came up when I was asked about it," Damian said.

At least about 30 of paintings will be displayed with three genre of different paintings. Ten of expressionis paintings, ten of pop-art paintings, and ten of minimalist paintings (White on White).

Realism substance in Damian's painting was deliberately avoided, in order to provide the dynamics of such works, more over when the true realism of OAM will be materialized in the form of cinematography.

In the painting exhibition they are also 14 of paintings to be auctioned, and the money will be donated to help the program of Yayasan Lupus Indonesia [Indonesian Lupus Foundation].

Damian Dematra learnt to paint in 1998 with the guidance of the senior painter, Mustika, that continued with self-learning by directly experiment with various kinds of techniques and media.

In year 2005 – 2006 Damian was facing 'an art painting exploration madness' so he could accomplisged 365 paintings in various styles and more than 1, 000 sketchs in a year. This 'madness' moment finally ended after Damian found another madness in writing and film-making.

The exhibition will be held from June 23 to July 2010 and opened by Jaya Suprana (MURI founder). Damian also awarded by MURI [Indonesian Record Museum] for his ability to making a painting in 9 minutes. "I'm so glad with this award, this is a bless of my life," Damian said.