But Mochtar is one of Indonesia’s most remarkable post-war artists today. Throughout a career that spanned over 30 years (from the mid 50s to the late 80s), the artist engaged in the practices of both painting and sculpture, refusing to for sake either one medium for another. This meant that the he was well-informed in qualities of the three-dimensional as well as colour and design. A few of the most recognisable characteristics of his works include his cubist aesthetics and abstract expressionist tendencies in both paintings and sculptures.
Like many of his peers, he graduated from the Department of Fine Arts in the Institute of Technology in Bandung, before continuing his postgraduate studies in America (namely in Rhode Island School of Design, Art Students League of New York, Sculpture Centre of New York and Massachusetts Institute of Technology) . He reoriented himself in Bandung after, in the later half of the sixties to continuing working and teaching in his alma mater. The artist passed three decades later in 1993.
But Mochtar’s works have been shown in exhibitions in the Americas, Europe and Asia . He was also awarded the Stralen Prize at the first Asian Young Artist Exhibition in Tokyo in 1957 .