Art summit entertains Jakartans with quality performances
JAKARTA (JP): Jakartans warmly greeted renowned local and foreign artists during the second week of their performances at the Second Art Summit, with tickets to W.S. Rendra's play Perjuangan Suku Naga (The Struggle of the Dragon Tribe) sold out a few days before the show.
"I regret not buying the tickets much earlier. It's my fault, I know that Rendra has lots of fans," Juanita, who missed the play, told The Jakarta Post.
The art summit's head of public relations, Yusuf Susilo Hartono, said that all seats for the play were already sold out several days before the performances took place on Sept. 29 and Sept. 30.
Perjuangan Suku Naga was staged for the second time in the country after it was first performed here in 1975.
The three-and-a-half hour play centers around the fight of Suku Naga (The Dragon Tribe), in protecting their land from being taken over by the government to make way for the development of a mining project.
In their struggle, the tribe deals with corruption, collusion, social injustice and natural exploitation from the ignorant government.
Known as one of the country's most prominent theatrical figures, Rendra doesn't normally hold any dress rehearsals for his plays.
But in the art summit, he surprised journalists with his willingness for a dress rehearsal, a day prior to the performance.
Yusuf said that for years, Rendra, better known as Willy, was so confident that he would not conduct a dress rehearsal for any of his plays.
But, the art summit's committee would not give up trying, even though it had to use the power of the press.
"I went up to him (Rendra) and showed him the number of journalists that were coming to report on and take photographs of his two-day play," Yusuf said. This year's art summit has been covered by around 150 local and foreign journalists.
Then he explained that there was a downside to such `confidence'. If the play did not meet the audiences expectations, three things could happen: no reviews, no photographs and worst of all, bad reviews.
"The next day, Rendra agreed to hold a dress rehearsal," Yusuf said cheerfully.
Apart from Rendra, art lovers were also entertained by dynamic dancers from the Bremer Tanztheater, a dance troupe from Bremen, Germany, led by Susanne Linke.
In the art summit, the group featured three of its best choreographies: Frauenballet (Women's Ballet) -- Linke's legendary piece, Heisse Luft (Hot Air) and Also Egmont, Bitte (So Please, Egmont), on Thursday and Friday in Gedung Kesenian Jakarta (Jakarta Playhouse).
A lecturer from the Jakarta Institute of the Arts, Tommy F. Awuy, who was in the audience, said that actually, the dancers' movements were repetitious. "But they're great, especially in their concept of space, blocking and color," Tommy told the Post after the show.
Noted dancer Farida Feisol also did not miss the performance. "Forget Ballet, it is passe... I think this is the dance of the day. You can no longer talk only of the dance technique in this piece. Everything is used (or manipulated...): the props, the space. All to perfection," she told the Post.
On Friday, Musicatreize from France entertained audiences at the Taman Ismail Marzuki art center on Friday and Saturday with Humoristique as its theme.
The group uses plays on words, vocal tricks and echoing effects in its 20th century compositions.
The final performers in the second week were the Insomnio Group, a group consisting of musicians from the Netherlands, Germany and Spain. The group performed, among others, five compositions by famous Dutch composer Theo Loevendie at Gedung Kesenian Jakarta. (ste/46/ylt)