May 4, 2005
ormer
U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young’s portrait was officially unveiled this past April
at Georgia State University, Atlanta, Georgia. The unveiling was part of a
week’s worth of dedication ceremonies for the University’s Andrew Young
School of Policy Studies. Among the dignitaries attending the week’s
events was former President Jimmy Carter. The commissioned oil painting of
Ambassador Young hangs in the main lobby of the school and is part of its
permanent collection. The building is located at 14 Marietta St., NW in
downtown Atlanta.
The painting was executed in a style that is not often
seen today; similar in many respects and tone to the style and feeling of
the old masters akin to Rembrandt. The artist, who did the painting, Machyar
Gleuenta, not only shares a connection to these old masters professionally
but personally has strong ties to the principals that most people
automatically associate with Andrew Young’s public career and life. In fact
given Mr. Gleuenta’s unique background it could easily be argued that hardly
a better choice, symbolically and artistically, could have been made in
terms of his being the one to paint Andrew Young’s portrait.
As a political refugee from his war torn country,
Indonesia, Machyar Gleuenta
knows first hand the depths of depravity that nations and governments run
amok can sink to, and to which Ambassador Young’s career has been devoted to
fighting and ending.
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Georgia
State University |
Mr. Gleuenta was born in Acheh, Sumatra epicenter of
the recent, horrific tsunami that killed at least 250,000 people just in
Acheh. At the age of eight, Machyar was caring for his family’s water
buffalos that plowed the family’s rice fields. He first began drawing and
painting at the age of ten with no one to give him formal instruction. Yet,
despite such seemingly insurmountable, incongruous obstacles to becoming a
fine art artist, a mere nine years after arriving in the United States and
receiving asylum he has risen to painting the portrait one of America’s most
famous sons, Ambassador Young; the "world’s mayor" – as the University
refers to Mr. Young.
Machyar Gleuenta’s is an "American Success Story"; a
story of how a man with a dream can succeed against all odds so long as he
never gives up. Yet, his achievement is in no way diminished by
acknowledging that if not for women and men such as Ambassador Young
- helping to make the path easier by fighting for human and civil rights in
America and the world - Machyar’s journey would have been even more
difficult - possibly even impossible.
Machyar
Gleuenta Background
In 1994 with
the help of friends he made at the American Embassy in Jakarta and after
eight years of studying English and creating a body of work to justify it,
he was given a full scholarship to the Maine College of Art in Portland,
Maine. Ultimately, leaving there and continuing his studies at the
Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia, PA. The oldest school
of fine art in the United States and one of the most highly regarded schools
of classical painting and art in the world.
Machyar’s Artistic Style
Machyar paints
portraits in a style that is reminiscent of the "old masters" akin to
Rembrandt. His portraits not only capture the essence of a man or woman’s
character but tell an engaging story of whom and what they are or were by
the elements and visual cues he includes. His goal being to enable even
someone who didn’t know the portrait’s subject to discern a bit of what
their hopes, dreams and beliefs might have been.
Such is the portrait of Andrew Young that Machyar
Gleuenta has brought into being. You almost feel when you walk into the
lobby, as though you have somehow found your way into a Museum. Machyar’s
goal in painting Ambassador Young’s portrait was to go beyond the average,
dutiful painting that you so often see executed of company executives. The
painting itself is 72 x 54 inches and simply by those measurements alone it
commands a powerful presence in the spacious lobby of the Andrew Young
School of Policy Studies. However, this painting does not rely simply on its
physical presence to command your undivided attention.
But words can only convey mental images and this is a
painting that must be seen to be appreciated. Fortunately, now it can be
viewed by all of us with an appreciation of fine art as well as an
admiration of Ambassador Young.
The oil painting of Ambassador Young hangs in the main
lobby of the school and is part of its permanent collection. The building is
located at 14 Marietta St., NW in downtown Atlanta.
For more information about the artist please contact
the artist's representative: Erik Ciel at 213-503-0821
