Zico Albaiquni
Published October 23, 2020
A great deal of Zico Albaiquni’s art consists of paintings of paintings or paintings within paintings. Another way of putting it is he paints the activity of art, mostly through the lens of art history. In his vibrant multicolored landscape and figurative paintings, you'll easily see artists making art, people examining art, shops selling art, and other motifs that playfully evoke moments in art history and conventions in art. His palm trees and the color palette, for instance, are hardly a matter of taste. They are a self-conscious adoption of romanticized landscape paintings promulgated by Dutch colonists among Albaiquni’s forebears, Indonesia’s Mooi Indies painters.
These motifs aren't mere quotations for the sake of homage. They emerge out of a study of the relationship between the artist, artwork, viewer, and art history. This keen attention also allows Albaiquni to locate his own artistic practice within a wider arc of art history and painterly representation. Most recently, he has begun incorporating his own studio as a motif in his compositions.
Zico Albaiquni is an Indonesian contemporary artist. Apart from exhibitions in his home country, he has exhibited in Australia, Italy, France, Austria, the Netherlands, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Albaiquni was a finalist of the 2012 Bandung Contemporary Art Award, 2012 Soemardja Award, and the 2012 Asia Award at Tokyo Design Week. His works are part of the collection of the Queensland Art Gallery, Gallery of Modern Art Australia, National Gallery of Australia, Singapore Art Museum, Museum MACAN, and Bega Valley Regional Gallery.