SUSAN NORRIE

The exhibition Susan Norrie: Field Work 2006-2016, premiered an ambitious new work – aftermath (2016) by Susan Norrie, one of Australia’s most highly regarded multidisciplinary artists.

To create this new work Norrie returned to Sidaorjo in East Java, Indonesia to the site of what has become known as the ‘LUSI mud volcano’ (a contraction of Lumpur – the Indonesian word for ‘mud’ and Sidoarjo – a subdistrict of the Porong area). She first explored this catastrophe in her sixteen-channel video installation HAVOC (2006-07), which debuted as part of Australia’s representation at the 52nd Venice Biennale in 2007. As such, the date range of the exhibition’s title, 2006-2016 represents Norrie’s commitment to and work as an artist ‘in the field’.

Since it began on 29 May 2006, the mud volcano (otherwise known as the ‘Lapindo mudflow’ because of the exploration activities of Lapindo Brantas, the Indonesian oil and gas company drilling in the area at the time) has subsumed thirteen villages and displaced tens of thousands of people. While debate around whether LUSI was a man-made or natural disaster continues to this day, the Indonesian authorities’ ability to stem the flow of mud –which at its peak was as much 180,000 cubic metres per day – remains frustratingly elusive.

In the two single channel projections comprising aftermath, Norrie juxtaposes the bleak and dystopian landscape of LUSI with the activities of local shrimp farmers, who harvest in ponds or dykes in the same region, and whose traditional and sustainable farming techniques draw on many decades of knowledge and experience. The work’s meditative pace, soundtrack and especially its painterly use of muted colour also reference Dutch landscape painting, recalling Indonesia’s complex history of colonisation.

aftermath considers the convergence of traditional knowledge, ecology, science and technology, and consequently builds upon Norrie’s sustained rumination on the impact of man-made and natural disasters on the environment, on structures of power and the dispossessed, on the fine line between exploration and exploitation, and on the extraordinary resilience of humankind. As she has said:

In light of recent environmental and humanitarian disasters within Indonesia and the Asia/Pacific region, there are many indicators and forewarnings that should be changing the ways that we think about the world. It's as if the elemental forces of nature seem to be demanding this seismic shift from humans.[1]

The following interview is based on conversations and email exchanges between Susan Norrie and Kelly Gellatly between February and March 2016.

Kelly Gellatly: aftermath has developed from a proposal that initially had you working in Japan, concentrating on the active volcano Sukurajima, which was once an island but is now connected, after an eruption in 1914, to the mainland’s Osumi Peninsula. In your own words, “metaphorically, this eruptive force represents primordial nature, as unreliable in its mood as its power is untameable.”

We have, however, ended up in East Java, Indonesia with aftermath, yet the connection between the two countries in your work, as in life, is neither tenuous nor accidental. Can you please explain what drew you back to Indonesia almost a decade since your last visit?

Susan Norrie: Going back Indonesia almost a decade after filming HAVOC, my project for the Venice Biennale in 2007, wasn’t something that came out of the blue. It was an extension of my ongoing relationship with Japan. Prior to that first trip to Indonesia in 2006, I had been exploring possible projects with contacts at JAXA – the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency – as a way of expanding my focus on environmental issues. I have always been concerned with the socio-political implications of exploration and the impact on eco-systems and local communities, along with the collisions between traditional knowledge, exploration technologies and multinational investment in developing economies, and Japan at the start of 2006 launched the DAICHI (ALOS) [Advanced Land Observing Satellite]. As well as contributing to a precise mapping of the Asia Pacific region in particular, this satellite had the capacity to survey and monitor resource exploration and associated environmental issues.

As part of its space program, the Japanese researchers at JAXA were aware of seismic activity in Indonesia, which included the LUSI mud volcano eruption on 29 May 2006 and the disastrous ongoing consequences… unstoppable mud that submerged an ever-expanding area, displacing many thousands of people. One of the reasons for this comprehensive surveillance and accumulation of data was to instigate cooperative management and mitigation programs aimed at disaster prevention – an area that I was particularly interested in exploring. Obviously things were changing dramatically because of the effects of climate change, but in regard to Indonesia particularly, it was the monitoring of methane and the environmental impact of the burgeoning oil and gas industry, and an increasing network of inefficient, often leaking pipelines.

Whether the LUSI disaster was the result of volcanic activity or a mining accident, maintenance and governance in Indonesia is a complex socio-political issue and internationally there is much interest in outcomes and possible solutions. I have been fortunate through the internet to make contact with scientists across the globe who have devoted time to the causes and consequences and who have been willing to share their research with me. Along with the many exchanges I’ve had over the years with Barrie Pittock, formerly of the CSIRO, my Japanese research has been assisted by key individuals such as Mr Hamasaaki, Project Manager of the IBUKI GOSAT [Greenhouse gases Observing Satellite], and Dr Yokota from the National Environmental Agency in Japan. In realising my Indonesian-based projects I’m indebted to Dr Mark Tingay, an Australian geologist and academic; Phillip Drake, a Chicago-based lecturer in Environmental Studies, and Professor Masato Iguchi, a Professor at the Disaster Prevention Institute at Kyoto University who is also the Director of the Sakurajima Research Centre at the base of the volcano, near Kagoshima in Kyushu.

I had the opportunity to interview Masato Iguchi in 2013. I was curious about the DAICHI satellite program and the monitoring of seismic and volcanic activity… especially the possible links between earthquakes and eruptions. Given the Fukushima nuclear disaster, an obvious focus for me was Sakurajima and the fact that it’s about 50km away from the Sendai nuclear power plant.

I discovered that his initial research and interest in methane gases had led to an interest in volcanology which in turn became an ongoing monitoring of the Asia Pacific region, especially the increased seismic activity around Sakurajima. The interview formed the basis of my project RULES OF PLAY (2009-14), a work commissioned for L’avenir (looking forward), the 2014 Montreal Biennale. This projection focused on Sakurajima and the life of those who live and work within its shadow; and on Sakhalin Island; located within the Arctic Circle and under Russian control. Sakhalin’s developing oil and gas industry had been on my radar for some time and after getting the necessary permissions, I was able to visit the island in 2012. The link between Sakurajima and Sakhalin was the idea of coexistence… whether under the spell of a volatile and unpredictable natural force, or weathering life in harsh Arctic conditions as part of the drive to discover and extract oil and gas, the two locations encapsulated the precariousness of the human condition.

Thinking back about that first interview with Masato Iguchi, I guess I was trying to get out of him what he really thought about the realities of living in close proximity to an ageing nuclear power plant… especially one located within such a seismically-active landscape. But he didn’t seem able or didn’t want to answer that directly. Rather he talked around the issue from a scientific, philosophical and religious point of view. His response was quite poetic, which in many ways made his statements much stronger.

I decided I needed to interview him again. So in July 2015 I returned to Japan and met up with him, but without my Japanese cameraman and his assistant. I realised Masato Iguchi understood and spoke English much better than I had previously thought. This time my purpose was to dig a bit deeper about Sakurajima and its location, and soon our conversation shifted to the communities and their co-existence with the mountain. He admitted he felt a deep responsibility about his 30 years working as a volcanologist monitoring Sakurajima and the importance of this research for the million people who live in the surrounding area. While he is involved in disaster prevention and management, he is equally concerned with his role as an informant to the government or the bureau of meteorology, to ensure that data is readily available at any given moment. This time, we got around to discussing Fukushima and man-made disasters: not only did he admit that he thought Fukushima was a man-made disaster, but that the LUSI mud volcano in East Java was a man-made disaster as well.

With this, I realised that he too was very much interested in Indonesia and its many active volcanos. He is a key contributor to a Japanese initiative for joint international research focusing on particular environmental issues – the Science and Technology Research Partnership for Sustainable Development (SATREP), another disaster management team he has been involved in for many years. During the interview, he suggested I attend one of their workshops that was to take place in Yogyakarta later that year, November 2015. It would be a joint Indo-Japanese forum focused specifically of volcanos and especially on Mount Merapi, an active volcano located near the border between Central Java and Yogjakarta. Merapi had erupted at the end of May 2006 and is considered by many as a possible trigger for the LUSI mud volcano disaster.

This workshop/forum was a turning point for me with regards to the connections between my interest in Japan and my work in East Java. Masato Iguchi was thrilled that I wanted to take my Japanese ‘team’ with me… so that is how I got back to Indonesia. Given the relative proximity, I planned to revisit the LUSI mud volcano… I wanted to see what had happened to the people and their land.

KG: As an artist, what has been your experience working with scientists, and especially, cross-culturally?

SN: Scientists are not unlike artists in some ways, at one level their work is a leap of faith, and often they don’t have huge amounts of funding. While they are privy to new and often secret information, they are bound by the protocols associated with institutions, research and scientific methodology. At the same time however, many scientists have a strong moral compass and a sense of civic duty. In my experience, I have found the scientists I have contacted to be humanitarians and deeply concerned with environmental issues and sustainability.

Working inter-culturally – and across the Internet – one has to be open, inclusive and transparent. It’s about respect – not just for your colleagues and supporters, but about being sensitive to other cultures. With my Japanese team – my cameraman and his assistant/ interpreter – it’s all about trust, and trust takes time to build. This is one reason why I have focused on Japan in particular since 2009. I feel I have developed a working relationship that not only augments my working process, it enhances the finished project.

KG: What are your reflections on going back to the LUSI mud volcano nearly ten years later? Were there major differences in your sense of ‘the then’ and ‘the now’ in terms of what’s happening at LUSI and its impact on the community, or have things remained the same?

SN: Returning to LUSI was strange… everything was so familiar but at the same time it wasn’t. When I was there in 2006/2007 people were really struggling with the devastation, the mud flow was a unique situation.

At the time – and indeed since – there have been many opinions about what caused the massive rupture. I tend to agree with those who think it was directly related to inadequate exploration procedures undertaken by Lapindo Brantas the Indonesian oil and gas company in control of the drilling, and Santos, the Australian company who were their partners at the time. It seems that the cladding or inner casing of the hole wasn’t appropriate – but there are many factors too that have contributed to arguments about who and what was to blame. One question remains: why were they drilling in such a volatile area anyway? Regardless, it’s the ongoing impact on thousands of people and the villages that is crucial. To go back and see this dry, cracked wasteland is harrowing… thirteen villages lie buried under all that solidified mud.

The scene was quite different in 2006/2007. Buildings, factories and the villages were half submerged in this toxic sea. Ten years later, it’s deathly… walking over the land felt like you were walking over a vast tomb, all memories of a former life had disappeared… gone forever. This is what haunts. At the end of the day, despite the official explanations and the scientific discussions about how to solve the environmental problems, it’s the people who matter the most. A solution is crucial – it’s important that such an accident on this scale doesn’t happen again, but given the world-wide thirst for mineral exploration and extraction, I’m not sure the lesson has been learnt.

Given that I was attending the SATREP workshop in Yogjakarta and that I had decided I would revisit the LUSI mud volcano, I contacted Mark Tingay again after reading a New York Times feature by Rachel Numer [“Indonesia’s ‘Mud Volcano’ and Nine Years of Debate About Its Muck’, 21 September 2015] that quoted his research. He had already put me in contact with Hardi Prasetyo, an American-educated fellow geologist who is trying to establish a Geopark at the LUSI site; not only to deal with the ongoing disaster but to initiate research into such hazards and promote ways of ensuring the economic well-being of the people who live there. It was through Hardi – currently Chairman of BPLS [Badan Penanggulangan Lumpur Sidoarjo / The Sidoarjo Mudflow Mitigation Agency, a company formed by the government in 2008] that I gained access to the disaster zone. While suggesting that LUSI was the result of an earthquake and part of the complex seismic Arjuno-Welirang region, and that the mud volcano eruption was a geothermal manifestation of the conditions in the area, I was aware that this view was counter to many of the views of scientists the world over. Perhaps the promotion of seismic causes has to do with shifting responsibility to avoid compensation… a major payout given the vast number of people who were made homeless. Also, as many critics of the government explanation suggest, it has a lot to do with the oil and gas industry itself and the right to continuing mining throughout Indonesia… both on land and offshore. Returning to your question, I was shocked by the bleakness and the all pervasiveness of the oil and gas industry and its seeming disregard for people’s lives if they happen to be in the way of resource exploration.

Depicting the guys who work the dredges, I see them like frontline soldiers… there they are working seven days a week, ten or so hours a day, constantly dredging and stemming the mudflow. The machinery too seems tired and rundown… a sobering sight for me; the futility very poignant. In the 2006/2007 the situation was dramatic – it was headline news. Taking the story to Venice (another ‘sinking world’) was a way of showing what was really happening for the people as the disaster was unfolding. This time the LUSI site is bleaker… it is no longer hitting the headlines. LUSI was something that continues to haunt me, so returning was an attempt at some kind of resolution both personally, and because I felt the project was unfinished. The aim of presenting HAVOC in Venice was to represent to a wider audience the power of human resilience… I hope with aftermath, I’ve done that again.

KG: The inclusion of the footage of the shrimp farmers as a single-channel projection was a relatively late development in the realisation of the project. It represents as aspect of your investigation… the changes to both the environment and the remaining community since the eruption. Can you elaborate on this? 

SN: The shrimp farmers are an important connection between Japan and Indonesia. First there’s a link to Japan through Alter Trade – a company initially based in Shinjuku, Tokyo, that has been in operation since 1992 – who established a sustainable eco-shrimp farming system in East Java. So in terms of this project, there was already an existing Japanese-Indonesian relationship in the area affected by the mudflow. The second connection is the focus on sustainability and, for me, the shrimp farmers continuing a very traditional way of working the waterways. This highlights for me, the significance of indigenous knowledge… especially in the face of the disaster, that in this instance, one could link with ‘technological progress’.

The other thing that fascinated me seeing the famers in these ponds was the efficiency and the controlled way they worked. As a counterpoint to the dredging, the shrimp farmers represented an aspect of Indonesia that I had noted previously. Because a lot of the mud from the volcano is being pumped back into the Porong River which is parallel to the Brantas River and feeds into tributaries, my initial concern was that the dredging would have been a disaster for the shrimp farming industry. As depicted in the film, while the shrimp farmers – and perhaps the shrimps – appear to have adapted to the circumstances, I cannot help but feel that they, like many other villagers, are the exploited ones. For me, this sequence encapsulates coexistence, adaptation and ultimately, basic human survival.

KG: Can you describe your approach to the installation of aftermath at the Potter? What you’ve effectively created is two single channel projections, but in fact they comprise the one work.

SN: There’s an essential symmetry to aftermath and the two rooms at the Potter were ideal for my installation. It was obvious to me that if the walls and floor could be black then an immersive cinematic effect would be created. Symmetry is a crucial factor within the films: in one there are dredges working in the vast pools of mud and water around the mud volcano, and, in the other, shrimp farmers are working in the ponds. With the dredging there’s a sense of disenchantment and futility in the work; the shrimp farmers however, have developed an engagement with their working environment.

Prior to the LUSI disaster this was agricultural land populated by many villages: it was a delicate eco-system ruptured by the mud volcano disaster. What’s amazing though is that despite the LUSI eruption and the devastating mud flow that submerged the surrounding area, the shrimp harvesters and the workers on the dredges represent a form of resistance: the former intent on continuing their traditional work, the latter on preventing the endless mud from overflowing the embankments constructed to contain the disaster by redirecting the mud mixed with water into the already swollen Porong River, as way of managing the catastrophe and to stop further flooding of the land.

But in the end, regardless of the background story, my approach to documentary filmmaking is to create an experiential work where the viewer is put into the position as a witness, the narrative unfolding before them in the present. For me this all about the potency and metaphoric power of the moving image.

KG: The sense of resilience you focus on…  the extraordinary capacity of human beings to carry on in the face of adversity is obviously very important to you.

SN: Totally. I think it’s a key focus of most of my film projects. Even though, at times, the subject matter may appear quite bleak, I think given the recent history of man-made and natural disasters, and the consequences of human error, bleakness is inevitable… especially when you’re dealing with exploration technologies. I think the fact that human beings are often driven by greed, it’s impossible not to imagine nature taking revenge!

What remains astounding – and of great fascination to me – is the capacity of people to adapt and survive, drawing on that spirit of resilience in times of unbelievable misfortune. The ability to pick up and carry on… the courage, is something that I hope shines through no matter how bleak the terrain or how dark the world may seem.

KG: Finally, I wonder if you could speak about the intersection of film, documentary practice and video installation in your work. Do you consciously see and craft a moving image work such as aftermath as an amalgamation of these different but related disciplines?

SN: Well I was brought up in the era when television was first beamed into our homes… and when glossy, photographic magazines like Life brought the world and major events closer to Australia. Thinking back about those times, the 60s and 70s, I was captivated by that stuff… how it all rolled into this vast montage of images, memories, movement and colour.

In the 1990s many artists began to create what I consider to be a more research, archival-based practice. I know this is when my work began to absorb aspects of my upbringing… I consider these to be crucial, formative years. Once I spent much of my time in libraries, combing the shelves and trawling through archival footage for all sorts of material, but now the Internet is a vast readily available resource. I guess you could say that I was starting to work with the world… even if initially it was a world that came in via the TV and magazines. Thinking about it, embracing photographic, reprographic and digital technology into my practice is a continuation of something I had always done.

Since the 1990s this amalgamation of material, technology, process and presentation has changed not only the ways in which artists work and think about the world, it suggested ways artists and art could draw attention to social, political and environmental issues. For me, the fascination was the insidious power of broadcast media… the manipulations, the blurring of fact and fiction and political purpose. What emerged for me was a need to explore ‘in-the-between of things’… the lies beneath the surface of things. I sometimes think about this as ‘citizen journalism’… as ongoing field work; a necessary way to begin to talk about the world.

KG: What you say in terms of those definitions of practice is interesting because it seems to me that your decades as a painter have an important role to play in your film work; you feel it – they’re often quite painterly in a way.

SN: When you think about it, history painting documents life. While we think about the history of painting as a rich legacy that informs art practice today, it is also a history of the world, civilisations and events – whether they be myths and legends, religious stories or allegories, frontier or sublime landscapes, portraits or celebratory narratives. History is as much about human triumphs as it is about catastrophes and environmental disasters.

When I look at my video installations… UNDERTOW, even HAVOC, it’s all there. There’s a very strong connection with the history of painting, and especially the elemental aspects… the visceral qualities of oil, mud, stickiness etcetera.

For me there’s no difference between history painting, photography, film and the documentary genre… it’s just that in the latter, the image is moving!

Text © 2016, the authors and the Ian Potter Museum of Art, the University of Melbourne.
Images © Susan Norrie. Reproduced with thanks.

Notes

1 Email correspondence with the author, 12 March 2016.