RESTU TAUFIK AKBAR Steel Painting

Accoladed Artist Restu Taifik Akbar presents his artworks of novelty upon flat stainless steel plates painted horizontally on the floor with enamel paint, minimizing control and allowing puddles of paint colors to merge and result in abstract landscapes.

Originally from traditional oil painting on canvases, this cum laude Institute of Bandung Technology graduate’s undergraduate final project was titled “Magical for Rest” inspired from traveling, forest explorations and mountain climbing where years later he transformed evolved to steel and enamel paint.

This UOB Painting Gold Medalist believes in visual arts that transcend mediums where painting and sculpture traditional practice are fused with a variety of materials, techniques, and expression styles. Field Expansion Phenomenons where medium-centric shifts to more conceptual exploration precedence doesn’t imply an end to specific artistic mediums but instead heightens fluidity and intersections.

Restu paints with a medley of high contrasting paint colors to artfully depict natural landscape objects of tree appearances in winding vertical strokes, sunlight filters through tree trunks, branches and twigs that are made rhythmically intersecting and dividing color fields, appearing as moments in the morning or evening.

Taufik’s oil paint on canvas landscape painting expressed comparatively static-esque frozen-like imagery hence his dissatisfaction that led him to experiment painting on materials that render reflection in real-time. Painting on reflective objects isn’t totally new where Michaelangelo Pistoletoo painted on mirrors in the 1960s and on stainless steel in the 1980s. Akbar’s method is rather specific where he used enamel paint to paint horizontally on the floor while incorporating landscape elements of flowing water, infinite imagery of stairs and intentionally creating further reflections by scraping off parts of the painting.

Space and time are dynamic and living dimensions which Restu found existing in stainless steel media that disclose the observer’s reflections as an integral part of the artwork. Stainless steel does not only render visual sensation experiences but a tension between viewing the painting and perceiving oneself in the reflection. This tension easily divides and exposes deeper levels of consciousness of art enthusiasts.

Experiencing Restu’s artworks offers a novel perspective upon 21st century influences revealing fragmented interferences, fusion, hybridity, paradoxes, and subversion of grand noble aweinspiring modern values and experiences such as in social media selfie exhibitionism.

Painter Restu Taufik Akbar showcased thirty two group exhibition attendances, two solo exhibitions and was awarded a 2015 Finalist of Nalar Sensasi Seni, 2017 Finalist of Bandung Contemporary Arts, and a 2022 UOB Painting of the Year Gold Award.