BUANASENI

Title: Nasi Kandar Kampung Melayu
Medium: Photography
Photographer: Johan Ishak
Time/Date: {Date and time not recorded}, 1999
Place of creation: Penang
www.buanaseni.blogspot.com

ASI literally means rice, a staple food of the Far-East-Oriental and Kandar is the act of carrying goods on the shoulders - a short description of food sold by traders carrying buckets of rice and curries on their shoulders, though you don't get to see this anymore (hence the photograph being a premised establishment of Nasi Kandar hawker).

Nasi Kandar has been a phenomenal attraction to Penang for many years. This is a perfect example of culture assimilation as a result of immigration policies introduced by the colonial masters (Portugese, Dutch & British) of the Malay Peninsula. This is typical of the development in the straits settlement such as Malacca and Temasek (Singapore) since the trading days of the Malacca Entreport Empire in the 1500's where Indians, Chinese, Arabs and the Malay-Indo travellers travelled via sea to meet and trade.

This combination of steamed white rice and various curry dishes took its origin from the Indian taste evolusionised into the Malay environment. A legacy of the Jawi Peranakan or "Mamak" (Malay-Indian descendants predominantly Muslims). Unlike its counterpart, the Malay-Chinese "Baba Nyonya" sweet sour hot chilli dishes, Nasi Kandar offers a unique explosion of spices on the taste butts - a blended sensation of cloves, anise stars, cinnamon sticks, cardamom pods (together referred to as "Empat Sekawan" or the Friendship of Four); as well as fennel, cumin, mustard seeds, onions, garlics, chillies, tamarind and a whole lot of other spices cooked with veggies, fish, meat or poultry.

These spices seemed to have been the Gold commodities for the Europeans as food preservatives. In the absence of a refrigerator 500 years ago, spices were regarded as the new age technology equal to that of the mummification preservatives of the Eqyptians - a technology sufficiently advanced to have pursuaded the Europeans to invade the East, inclusive of India, the Malay Peninsula, surrounding Islands of Indonesia-Philippines and Indo-China.

Referring back to the culture assimilation, Nasi Kandar is accepted by a whole wide range of ethnic group in the Malay Peninsula namely Malay, Indian and Chinese. So you do get these various ethnic groups to venture into food business that involves Nasi Kandar - hence the existence of Nasi Kandar Kampung Melayu, Malay for "Malay Villagers' Nasi Kandar".

Title: Pantai Asmara Penang
Medium: Water Colour
Dimension: 27.3cm X 37.5cm
Artist: Johan Ishak
Time/Date: {Time not recorded}, 1 Dec 1992
Place of Creation: Shah Alam
Given as a gift to Dato' (Dr) Mohamed Ishak Ariff
www.buanaseni.blogspot.com

HE ending months of 1992 was a leisure period after having gone through the exams (SPM) for high school. Knowing my interest in art, my father had given me a photo he shot up north in the Island of Penang for me to paint. Not having any experience in oil, water colour was the best choice at that time.

This panorama is meant to highlight the soothing feeling of passion and love which is appropriately displayed by a backdrop of sunset and overlooking a row of Casuarina by the beach side. What gave the name for this area is the rock island on the far left inwards the bay. This rock island is called "Lovers' Isle", an Isle for which lovers spend their time watching the sunset and carving their love declaration on the rock. The beach was therefore named "Pantai Asmara", Malay for "Lovers' Beach".

Title: Solitary II
Medium: Multimedium (Pencils and Water Colour)
Dimension: 37.5cm X 27.3cm
Artist: Johan Ishak
Time/Date: {Time and date not recorded}, 2000
Place of Creation: Shah Alam
Given as a gift to Dato' (Dr) Mohamed Ishak Ariff
www.buanaseni.blogspot.com

HIS piece was done in the year 2000, 5 years from the first attempt of a multimedium piece, Solitary, as published in another blogspot earlier. Again, it's a pencil work for the main object, a Sun Bear by a cracked vertical metamorphic rock wall; complemented by water coloured yellow sun and yellow flowers of a Bonzai-like plant supporting a bee hive.

Similar to the earlier piece Solitary, this one tells a story of a lonely Sun Bear living in the wild feasting on honey from bees... except that, this poor creature has not quite reached his meal. With its front left leg sticking out, the creature is expressing its frustration, desire and a subliminal message of a lonely creature helpless without any companion to share his agony.

So far I have only done 2 pieces of the "Solitary" series in Oil Painting, this one being "Solitary II". A Photography version was also done is Solitary III.

Title: Solitary
Medium: Multimedium (Pencils and Water Colour)
Dimension: 27.3cm X 37.5cm
Artist: Johan Ishak
Time/Date: {Time not recorded}, 25 Feb 1995
Place of Creation: Shah Alam
Given as a gift to Dato' (Dr) Mohamed Ishak Ariff
www.buanaseni.blogspot.com

HIS piece was done in 1995, couple of hours before my flight back to Melbourne to resume my studies in the Australian Autumn. It's a pencil work for the main object, i.e. the Moose on the side of a hill; and water coloured red sun to complement the "Solitary" mood set by the Moose. There is no history behind this work other than an attempt to do a multimedium piece of art. The original backdrop is actually white but photography without flash lights (to avoid reflection on the glass cover framing the piece) had somewhat given an antique and seasoned effects like that of an Egyptian papyrus - reinforced by the tiny vertical and horizontal pencil lines at the fringe of the hill side sketch.

The mood set in this piece is "Solitary": A lonely hoofed mammal of the forests of northern North America seeking for enlightenment from the glowing red hot sun above. The sketch-like hill side was an idea plagarised from Japanese drawings often found in Asian hotels' lobbies. The red sun is meant to be a red-wax stamp but in the absence of such waxing material, thick water colour was sufficient to allow the word "Solitary" to be carved on the red-filled circle.

5 years after this piece was done, another same concept piece was done in 2000 called Solitary II. A photography version was also expressed in Solitary III.

Title: Mikraj
Medium: Photography
Photographer: Johan Ishak
Time/Date: 6:00 pm, {Date not recorded}, 1999
Place of creation: Marangaroo, Perth
www.buanaseni.blogspot.com

USTRALIA offers you the luxury of space. With its dessert like continent, the sky seems like a huge screen and the land sprawl with little highland to obstruct the magnificent work of nature when the sun completes its semi-circle journey. The best of "Sky" I've ever seen was in Australia, be it plain blue, the marching of clouds or sunset. It was reported in various journals that Australia has an extraordinary clear sky predominantly due to the huge hole in the ozone layer above it - possibly caused by thousands of years of natural forest fires.

I must also share with you a spectacular sighting of mine in the desert of Perth, Australia. Lying on the Earth looking into the sky at night, I once saw a faint stripe of tiny stars across the sky revealing an arm of the Milkyway visible from a planet (Earth) that is within another arm of the galaxy. How cool is that? This has to beat the sighting of Halley's Comet (which I witnessed sometime back in the early 80's).

So I decided to take photos of the Australian Sky - as attached. These 2 images were taken from the open land of Marangaroo, Perth.

The first image simply shows multiple layers of colours merely produced by nature's very own dusk. I have also used this photo in my blogspot for the poem "PETALA MASA", which simply means "Multilayers of Time" in Malay: Mutilayers of colours as a result of time (i.e. Dusk). This snapshot reveals:

1. BLACK (trees blocking the sunlight)
2. YELLOW (evening sun dispersing light at the eve of setting),
3. ORANGE (reflection of sunlight on the clouds)
4. BROWN/REDDISH (upper side of clouds absorbing dusk-light)
5. BLUE (day light not willing to surrender to dusk)
6. WHITE (spotted clouds shielded from the sunset)
7. INDIGO (arrival of darkness as light disappears)

The second image reminds me of a burning Phoenix spreading its wings across the sky with the effects of the sunset giving a fire-like texture on the group of clouds that spread like the wings of an eagle.

The multiple layers of colours are symbolic of a journey required to reach the heavens and the "Phoenix" simply represents magical touch to such a journey; both divine in its own way. This is consistent with at least 1 biblical text on the subject "ascending to the heavens": In the Quran, Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon him), once travelled from Jerusalem (Al-Aqsa) to the heavens to meet God Almighty. In his odyssey, he went through multiple layers of sky (If I am not mistaken, 7 layers) with the aid of a glowing creature with wings (like a Phoenix perhaps?). This journey is called "Mikraj" (Arabic for Ascending).