JAKARTA – Museum MACAN will open a brand-new art exhibition on June 13, 2026. This exhibition features the talented director and artist Riar Rizaldi. The show bears the title Period Piece and marks his very first solo museum exhibition in Indonesia. Rizaldi already enjoys a highly successful international career. Now, he invites visitors to explore a unique cinematic experience inside the gallery walls.
A Dark and Captivating Atmosphere
However, this exhibition feels very different from the other five art shows inside the museum. Visitors will walk through a dark, quiet, and slightly scary hallway. This eerie atmosphere creates a sense of unease for anyone who enters.
Rizaldi explains that his creations usually connect science, technology, and cinema. Therefore, he wants to show how modern technology changes our view of moving images. He wants people to discover the hidden meanings behind the screen.
“I want to show how technology forces us to look at moving images differently, or reveal what lies right behind them.”
— Riar Rizaldi
Stepping Into the Theaters of the Past
To achieve this goal, Rizaldi built a special movie theater and a nostalgic lobby. For instance, the front section features a new installation, Bioskop Asymptotic (2026). Museum MACAN specifically commissioned this piece for the show. The installation recreates an Indonesian movie theater lobby from the 1990s where time stops moving. Consequently, viewers experience a strange feeling of frozen time.
In the next room, visitors can watch Fanfictie: Volcanology (2025). This second film examines the historical clash between Dutch colonial science and Javanese cosmology.
Cinematic Labor and Future Nostalgia
Furthermore, the artist presents a third installation, Tropenkolder (2026). The Eye Filmmuseum in Amsterdam commissioned this specific artwork. This piece looks back at historical phantom-ride films and the famous 1923 railway strike. Through this work, Rizaldi reflects on cinema, human labor, and slowness as powerful tools against fast-paced modern life.
Interestingly, he also brought old rattan cinema chairs all the way from Padang, West Sumatra. Rizaldi grew up in Bandung and frequently visited the old Pasundan Teater. He remembers it as a dirty, scary, Class B theater with a messy yet beautiful front wall. This theater represented the historical shift toward commercial movies.
Ultimately, Rizaldi wants everyone to remember the golden age of old cinema halls. His art successfully wakes up a deep feeling of “nostalgia for the future.” Before this exciting homecoming at Museum MACAN, Rizaldi displayed his brilliant creations at MoMA in New York and the Centre Pompidou in Paris. He also participated in the Venice Architecture Biennale and major film festivals in London, Berlin, and Locarno. Now, Indonesian art lovers can finally enjoy his world-class vision.
