"Memoirs of Nothing"

"Memoirs of Nothing"

by Aralee NIken,

for Kelas Pagi Yogyakarta's Halo #KPY5 exhibition

Prologue,

This was my first styling for a fashion photography exhibition,

and I must say I love these very much.

The first picture is my favorite. It was surprisingly resembles Monalisa so much that at first we called this series as "Lolalisa".

We were as lucky as hell as it was accidentally the very first shot taken to test the light.

Photography: Niken Pamikatsih

Styling: Akib Aryou

Model: Lola Zieta

MUA: Dita Djunaedy

Plaza Ambarrukmo Magazine June-July 2014

Plaza Ambarrukmo Magazine

 June-July 2014

ARABIAN DREAMS

(Trendsetter/Beauty)

Photographer: Niken Pamikatsih

Stylist: Akib Aryou

Model: Indah Chandra, Lola Zieta 

MUA & Hijab-do: Wardah Cosmetics

The Craving

"The Craving"

"Boredom: the desire for desires."

Leo Tolstoy, in Anna Karenina.

~

"I have immortal longings in me."

William Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra (1600s), Act V, scene 2, line 282.

Self-produced by Akib Aryou.

Styling: Akib Aryou.

Copyright by #AwareHouse 2014.

Prologue: The Craving

So basically the next post is titled as "The Craving" because I craved for a lot of things lately...

Boredom, if it even existed, nor felt, led me craving a lot of things. I am not going to state what are those, some were utterly silly, some were secretly private...

Uh oh. Ambiguity.

But whatsoever. Growing up, I learned to be honest to myself about my own desires. I had to if I want to be more mature. It's about accepting the light and the dark side and stay normal with that. Everybody does have unspeakable desires: those who claimed they have none are the worst liars. I knew you Readers might shocked to read this, but I guessed kids just grow up. And this time, I'm bored of being poise. Your luck it's not "always".

Yet I have craved for posting another self-made portfolio, too, here. So here I am posting it.

I felt terribly sorry, too, that I haven't written anything for a long while so far. To be honest, studying in a subject that forces you to write every single day truly suck all imaginations out. Well, actually, the energy to put down every imagination out. I still have loads of them in my head.

Well, enjoy, Readers.

Tonight

Tonight, I learned not to expect too much on anything.
Tonight, I learned not to put way too high expectation on myself.
Tonight, I learned that sacrifices exist; and tonight, I learned
             that some sacrifices I have made are not that worthy.
Tonight, I learned not to push my friends away;
             because tonight, I learned that I have just done it.
Tonight, I realized that it is okay to break down and cry

             Only that tonight, I still don't know whether it is the right time to.

Plaza Ambarrukmo Magazine February/March 2014

Plaza Ambarrukmo Magazine

July/August 2013

"ORIENTAL CARNIVAL"

(Cover)

Photographer: Niken Pamikatsih

Model: Shabrina Sungkar, Ikhsan

Stylist: Juris Bramantyo

MUA & Hairdo: Indah Nymphaea

Stylist Assistant.: Akib Aryou

Wardrobe: Touch of Ramadhani, Izzue Centro

"SHANGHAI BLOSSOMS"

(Fashion spread/Editorial)

Photographer: Niken Pamikatsih

Model: Shabrina Sungkar, Ikhsan

Stylist: Juris Bramantyo

MUA & Hairdo: Indah Nymphaea

Stylist Assistant: Akib Aryou

Wardrobe: Touch of Ramadhani, Denis Sarotta Couture, Etherea by Dana Rahardja, NO, The Executive, Izzue, Centro, Bellagio 

Plaza Ambarrukmo Magazine November/December 2013

Plaza Ambarrukmo Magazine

July/August 2013

"THE CLASSIC CELEBRATION"

(Cover)

Photographer: Niken Pamikatsih

Model: Desy Vishnu & Ghemma Garay

Stylist: Juris Bramantyo

MUA & Hairdo : Indah Nymphaea
Stylist Assistant: Yasmine Pawitra

Production Assistant: Akib Aryou

Wardrobe: Black Code Tailor, Centro, Guess, Donini

"GATSBY MUSE"

(Fashion spread/Editorial)

Photographer: Niken Pamikatsih

Model: Desy Vishnu, Ghemma Garay

Stylist: Juris Bramantyo
MUA & Hairdo: Indah Nymphaea
Stylist Assistant: Yasmine Pawitra

Production Assistant: Akib Aryou
Wardrobe: Minimal, Centro, Guess, Optik Seis, Mangos, Izzue, Donini

Apology.

This is very personal, actually, intended for those whom I loved the most. But as I made my mistake in public, I will apologize in public also.

***

We human make mistakes. Sometimes, we do them consciously. But sometimes, we plain oblivious to its real consequences. We don't know who will be hurt for those experiments we have. And sometimes, unconsciously, we hurt those who loved us most.

I have done a great and terrible mistake. What makes it worser is that I do the thing consciously. What I didn't conscious about is the feeling of hurt that my closest ones did feel when they found it out. There, I have made a fool of myself.

Now I acknowledged, with amount of remorse that I surely can never express suitably, that I have strayed away from who I was. Unfortunately, it was not in a positive way that many people had hoped me to be. In a venture of exploring maturehood and challenging boundaries, I had broken my own limitations and obliviously leaving majestic ideals I had always been taught of. I lost my own morale compass in a pursuit of du jour dreams; I forgot my own virtue in a quest of contemporary reveries.

The implications didn't only hurt people around me, but also myself. To be honest, I am terrified of the amount of damage I have caused to their trust. Moreover I have no idea of whoever else might have hurt in its wide range of destruction. I couldn't even bear to imagine the consequences on myself.

This might not make amend for everything, but I have learned my lesson. Therefore, I apologize. This might never enough to those I have hurt and neglected their feelings; but I must tell them that that will never happen again. I will change myself. I will fix these broken mirrors on my face. I will collect the shattered crumbles on the floor and try to build whatever broken anew. I have learned, what you, my closest ones, have always aspired me to be; and sincerely I believe that your hopes are God's fate I must have faith in.

You have no idea how gratituous I am to have you guys to be a reminder of truest things I had faith in my life; for taking my wandering car back into its supposed lane. I have always known that I will come into this emergency stage of life; thank God, you are the ones who I'll go through the phase with.

I have to be honest that for now, the path seems long and weary to me. I will fall, I will suffer; but I have suffered, you have suffered, and if martyrdom is the only way to compensate the sufferings I have made, then I will take it. I will walk home, to my past, to my old ideals, to my God's given virtues; I am coming back home to myself.

Thank you, and I am sorry for everything.

***

I hope that this will redeem everything. Guys, aku minta maaf.

Drama King, Drama Queens.

"DRAMA KING,
DRAMA QUEENS."

"All the world's a stage
And all the men and women merely players
They have their exits and their entrances
And one man in his time plays many parts..."
-

William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII, lines 139-166

Photography: Djare

Styling and MUA: Akib Aryou 

Model: Akib Aryou & Dian Cahayani

Copyright by #AwareHouse 2013.

Prologue: Drama King, Drama Queens.

I am quite excited to post my first photoshoot in 2014!

This photoshoot is quite ridiculous for me now that I look back. I took the shoot with my aunt, Tante Dian! She is actually my bestie Merlyn's mom, but as our family has been very close, I think it is fair enough to acknowledge her as my aunt (afterall, Tante Dian is very close to my mum). The whole photoshoot was totally spontaneous; one night, Tante Dian ask me, "Are you free tomorrow? Mas Djare wants to hold a shoot with you!" Mas Djare is a friend of Merlyn's family: he is a photographer, and I knew him since we helped Merlyn's charity together last Ramadhan. I had never joined any shoot he did so of course I was completely blank of the upcoming working condition, and for God's sake he told me almost literally a night before (yet he didn't tell me the theme, only some unhelping clues)! So I tried my best to improvise the whole thing I need to prepare for the next day's occasion.

The shoot went really well, even if I still regarded it for one of the most weirdest shoot I have ever done so far! The rush, the whole improvising thing... It doesn't mean that the shoot wasn't fun. It is fun, awkwardly hilarious! Just simply summarized, nothing can beat doing photoshoot with your aunt. You have to try it by yourself to know what it's like.

The title...

Well, improvisation: The title was inspired by what Tante Dian said at the photoshoot. Mas Djare was taking a single shoot of me and she commented on my pose. "Akib was a theatre actor," she said to Mas Djare, "No wonder he can do such dramatic poses."

That comment somehow got stuck in my mind. It hit me right because somehow, rather ridiculously, I have always been such of a drama queen. It is like my whole life was a theatre performance; and more than that, I live it consciously, like I am preparing an autobiography or a biopic of me. In a certain stage of my life, I imagined my life as truly a drama film naively, made me a very mellow person. A real live, 24/7 drama queen.

But I am not ashamed of that. In an artistic context, being dramatic helps me to expand. I always like a sense of theatricality in my works; theatre helped me to expand my aesthetique taste. Theatre world even has taught me to be adaptive and quick to improvise things: it helped me to changing my skin fastly and not afraid of any makeover. There is a quotation from Erika Linder, an androgyny model, which I think relate myself very much. She said that, "I have too much imagination for just one gender." And that is myself: I have too much imagination to handle one character only. I have a lot of personalities and capabilites. Didn't mean that I have split personality disorder, still; I just love so much to not being a person who I am; or, more precisely, to live a side of my multiple, diamond like personalities. I think that also explained why I joined theatre club in my high school.

That rhetorical showed in this shoot, which one I have cut my hair to be more masculine in a more androgyny-identity finding struggle (I will post this in another time, I suppose); from the very feminine previous photoshoot of "Mars and Venus", I tried to show more masculine duality. I try to live a different aspect of my androgynism. I am experimenting.

And if those explanations didn't work, well; afterall, I have fallen in love with theatrical world since I was in elementary school, and no matter how I thrive in other subjects, I will always love theatrical performances.

Not like any prologue I have ever written, this one is perhaps the most sappy and shallow one for you, Reader. But I deliberately will excuse myself. Somehow, for me myself, this photoshoot is one of the very personal shoot for me. I think I knew the reason why at the beginning, but as the time gone, I have forgotten them, even though I could still feel the impact. But whatsoever. Sometimes, you just couldn't explain things that are very important to you, because your subsconscious wanted to keep them merely for yourself. I think that is what personal means. And I am not being dramatic in this thing.