Performance | Tita Salina and Irwan Ahmett, Titik Api 2025

TITIK API (HOT SPOT) PERFORMANCE

Titik Api (Hot Spot) ignites with every significant effort, from traditional ceremonies to industrial actions, from fueling fossil vehicles to sparking nationalism. It also fuels tragic political statements, as seen in the actions of Sondang Hutagalung[1] and Aaron Bushnell.

In the increasingly heated equator, hot spots haunt us: they blaze across peatlands, devastate forests, and fuel extraction and greed. While some burn plastic to ward off mosquitoes, others use money to fuel polarization through thoughtless influencers. Impunity erodes spaces for meaningful unity, diminishing confidence.

Titik Api is close, burning through our workplaces, sparking conflicts within circles, and consuming feelings for ambition. Can it become a foundation for transformation? Like solidarity that’s transactional, or activism that feels artificial? Like opportunistic artists or cultural brokers trapped in nostalgia?

From the dark ‘Krakatau: The Tale of Lampung Submerged’ verses to the corrupted reform movements, will this period ignite a Titik Api that lights the sky or democracy? Will it burn bright, or extinguish before it reaches its goal?

Let’s ignite Titik Api in our hearts, minds, and actions—protect it together, even if our flames differ in color and heat.

An Invitation to Join Titik Api (Hot Spot) Procession

In the most fundamental connection between the body and space, humans often express it through a journey from a starting point to an end point, infusing meaning into thoughts, sensitivities, and even aspects that transcend collective memory. In Indonesia, rituals like the Kasada ceremony on Bromo volcano and the Nadran sea offering festival in the Jakarta Bay offer moments of personal awareness, sparking the fire of togetherness that illuminates the spaces of life. Although these events only last for a short time, they create significant impacts, helping to bind and strengthen us as we navigate this uncertain future.

Titik Api (Hot Spot) Procession is an invitation from Irwan Ahmett and Tita Salina to walk through the streets of Melbourne while carrying a used tire — symbolizing the wheel of civilization — inscribed with words that will be written together beforehand.

The trace and distance covered will accumulate the body's sensitivity with the city's space, providing an experience of the invisible points of civilization which often goes unnoticed when we walk too quickly.

From Jakarta, Makassar, Tahrir Square to Gaza used tires are always repurposed to express anger, frustration, and statements of resistance against tyrannical powers. The fire that burns from the tires often ignites the emotions, becoming a focal point for the struggle to achieve change. Although our Titik Api (Hot Spot) procession won't set the tire on fire, may it ignite a flame that spreads within the souls of its participants.

The procession is developed alongside ACCA’s current exhibition, The Charge That Binds, and as part of the Relational Ecologies Intensive. Learn more about the program and intensive here.

VENUES AND ACCESS

Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA)

ACCA is located at 111 Sturt Street, Southbank, in the Melbourne Arts Precinct. Enter from Sturt Street. There’s a tram stop nearby, and plenty of car parks and bike racks. It’s also a nice walk from Flinders Street train station.

ACCA is fully wheelchair accessible, with two accessible car park spaces just outside the entrance on Sturt Street and a wheelchair accessible bathroom. ACCA also has a wheelchair that is available on request for use by visitors. We also welcome Assistance Dogs in the gallery.

Read more about access and planning your visit here.

Image credit: Tita Salina and Irwan Ahmett, Prosesi Titik Api (still) 2024. Courtesy the artists

[1] https://voi.id/en/memori/111565