Soni Irawan Sold at Auction Prices

b. 1975 -

Born on 15 January 1975, Soni Irawan is the revered founder of Jogjakarta experimental band Seek Six Sick, which has since heavily influenced the spirit and energy of his art. Engulfing each canvas in an array of spontaneous strokes, sketchy figures and cut out pieces, Soni Irawan has long used his art to express his underlying interest in capturing the spirit of human survival in everyday life.


Born in 1975, You grew up in Yogyakarta, the art capital of Indonesia! You then graduated from the Indonesian Art Institute also located in Yogyakarta. Tell us about your first steps as an artist?

I attended the Indonesian Art Institute of Yogyakarta in 1993, to major in printmaking under the Fine Arts Faculty.

In the college, students of the printmaking major felt that they would not achieve anything or have a future because there were not many role models of printmaking artists in Indonesia. It doesn’t mean that there were no significant artworks in printmaking at that time, it just so-happened that the people of Indonesia were not able to fully appreciate printmaking artworks. Common people used to have no idea about printmaking, or how it is actually a part of fine arts. What they knew of artwork were sculptures and paintings. Hence, many of the printmaking graduates ended up working in publishing and advertising companies.

Throughout college, we were taught about standard and conventional printmaking, in which there were strict rules in creating artworks. There were many standards or rules that had to be obeyed in order for our work to be recognized as printmaking artworks.

Due to such conditions, most of the students expressed their creativity on the streets, by making mural paintings. Here (on the streets), we were able to freely express ourselves in creating our artworks without worrying about printmaking rules. We could express anything we wanted regardless the latest art concepts.

To me, besides mural painting, playing music in a band group has also become a medium to express myself.

In 2002, I decided to join Philip Morris ASEAN Art Awards. I thought that the competition was really good, as it accepted any type of artwork. Previous competitions had limited the participants to only present paintings. Philip Morris ASEAN Art Awards was probably the only prestigious art competition in Southeast Asia at that time. I used conventional graphic technique combined with stencil art that I got from street art. The competition had brought a satisfying result to me, since I was one of the best 5 participants, along with the late S. Teddy D, Ay Tjoe Christy, Ibrahim, and Zulkarnaini. Then, I joined the next step in Southeast Asia in 2003. That was I guess the initial steps of my art career.
Soni Irawan - Zorro

Zorro; self portrait – Acrylic, oilbar, spray paint, paint marker on canvas, 180cmX150cm, 2019.

You are a musician and one of the founders of a Yogyakarta experimental band Seek Six Sick. Your art is greatly influenced by the spirit and energy of rock music. Tell us about these jam sessions with your group and as a painter? Do you like how your art seems to mirror the “chaotic composition” of Seek Six Sick’s music?

My greatest inspiration is street art and the music I play: noise rock. I started playing music before creating artworks, and I learned a lot in discovering the process of making works that I loved in playing music. I want to paint just like I play my music, just like creating chaotic composition. Basically, my music making process is a jam session, it spontaneously fills each other’s gaps and responds to existing sounds, based on the preset nuances and themes we had decided on prior to the session.

I’ve tried to adapt these practices in creating my artworks/paintings and now I have a new band project, named Sakarin, that just released its first album just before the pandemic. Available now on all streaming platforms, such as ITunes music, Spotify, and Bandcamp under the label of Dugtrax