Two features distinguish this Jakarta Biennale 2009 from the previous ones organised by the Jakarta Arts Council. This is the first international Jakarta Biennale. It is also preceded and accompanied by events of various art disciplines, within a larger frame called “Arena.”

As such we expect that Jakarta Biennale 2009 could be enjoyed by more diverse, larger public, while at the same time taking advantage of various arts forms as vehicles to understand our changing environs—space, city, the world—more deeply and freely in public spaces.

Indeed, we are more and more in need of public infrastructures that are truly open and inclusive to help in processing meaningful urban societal integration. Because, we know that cities in Indonesia—probably also in all South East Asia and the world at large—are really facing three inter-related threats: the receding and shrinking role of the state (as the representative of the public), expanding privatisation, and invasive and intruding sectarianism. They are all too easily experienced every day in our public spaces. We know, too, that it is not easy to completely protect what is public. Often we have to resort to public-private partnership that is not always beneficial to the public because of some distortion. An example close by is the Gedung Imigrasi (a.k.a Gedung Kunstkring) in Menteng, Jakarta. It was repurchased and restore to its original condition with public money; but to operate and upkeep it, the government has to depend on a private sector that turned it into an exclusive upper class restaurant, the Buddha Bar. It lost its publicness, despite the public investment.

Another phenomenon is that, through the market, more art pieces find their way into the private space as private collection, whereas public spaces like public museums are losing their capacity to maintain its collection for public enjoyment.

As the role of the state is receding in representing “the public”, the ambition of “the private” gets even bigger to proclaim itself as public. “The public” no longer bases itself on an institutional consensus, but on the competing powers and images. Consequently, urban citizens can only be continuously suspicious of those shifts.

Besides being an opportunity to map visual art world development, as a biennale must be, Jakarta Biennale 2009 alo wishes to affirm the existence and the presence of of the public in various possible forms in diverse urban spaces that have emerged along the struggle of power and image. Arts are also a medium. With it we can evaluate the various forms of the public presence and the public spaces, and make sense out of the changes that are overwhelming the city and its citizens.

I would like to thank and congratulate all members of the organising committee, participating artists and curators that have made this great Jakarta Biennale 2009 possible. They have helped us to understand this complex world creatively. Big thanks go also to all partners—embassies, foreign cultural centers, sponsors, venue owners and managers, and media and their journalists. I reserve special thanks to Jakarta Governor, Bapak Fauzi Bowo, and his staff, that have greatly supported this Biennale and all its accompanying events.

I now request the willingness of Bapak Fauzi Bowo, Governor of Jakarta, to deliver his speech and open this main event of Jakarta Biennale 2009.