For ART SG Platform 2026, Yeo Workshop presents a constellation of works by Citra Sasmita drawn from three of her major international presentations: the 24th Biennale of Sydney, the Hawai‘i Triennial, and her installation at Frieze New York. Together, they reflect her expansive cosmology—one where ritual, womanhood, and ancestral knowledge move fluidly into contemporary space.
Anchoring the presentation are Sasmita’s elevated hanging installations, originally commissioned by the Biennale of Sydney, including Timur Merah Project X: Bedtime Storyconceived as sanctuaries of rest within the fair. Visitors are invited to sit beneath soft cushions suspended from the ceiling, entering a moment of pause and grounding. In addition, large textile works flank the walls that are Open hands—one of her recurring motifs—extend a gesture of welcome, signalling the work’s role as an offering and a conduit of energy between the artwork, the space, and the people who gather beneath it.
From the Hawai‘i Triennial, Sasmita’s cowhide paintings continue her deep engagement with fire as an elemental force. Inspired by the Pacific Ring of Fire, these works draw from Balinese ritual practices where cowhide is integral to communal ceremonies. The paintings reflect fire’s duality—its power to destroy, purify, and renew—mirroring cycles of creation and dissolution that underpin healing across cultures.
Her works use traditional Kamasan painting techniques from East Bali to reassert the female figure as a protagonist and decolonial voice. Sasmita unpacks the legacy of Baliseering—a Dutch colonial policy that manufactured the image of an “authentic” Bali while suppressing Balinese self-determination. By reimagining mythologies, folklore, and inherited iconographies through powerful female characters, she dismantles exoticised histories and proposes a post-patriarchal world shaped by women as healers, travellers, and survivors.
Across these works, Sasmita’s practice bridges cosmology, ritual, and contemporary feminism. She speaks to art’s potential to touch the divine, carry ancestral memory, and resonate viscerally—what Balinese philosophy describes as “taksu”, the spiritual charisma that animates a work of art. Her presentation at ART SG offers an encounter with that energy: intimate, restorative, and profoundly alive
