Cornucopia of calendars marks new year
Cornucopia of calendars marks new year
By Amir Sidharta
JAKARTA (JP): We are reminded of the new year by the various calendars that appear in the mail, included as give-aways when you make a purchase in shops, or are offered for sale in bookstores.
Last year many publishers adopted the use of compact disc holders for monthly calendars. The first of this kind seems to have appeared a few years ago, featuring Annie Leibovitz's striking photographs. Since then there have been many more titles featuring artists such as Cezanne, Dali, Klimt and Monet, to name but a few.
Now you can even get calendars in the 3.5" diskette format. One that I received featured a series of works by Indonesian photographers. Indonesians on Indonesia, an exhibition which was displayed in South Korea in commemoration of Indonesia's 50th anniversary last year included a small 3.5" diskette calendar as a charming spin-off product.
This calendar displays a selection of 12 photographic images from the show, one on each of the 12 pages. Below each photograph is a row of dates with the Sundays highlighted in bold type. On the flip side there is a table with seven columns and approximately five rows, providing a small box for each day of the month. Unfortunately, the space provided in each box is merely 12mm by 14mm, barely large enough to write anything in it.
The format of a calendar in the small diskette holder is so handy that I am sure it would make a great wedding souvenir.
A popular favorite on the market is Former Points of View, a collection of 12 postcards of Old Indonesia, produced by the Lontar Foundation. This calendar uses the basic desk calendar format. The decorative side shows the postcard image, with a full month calendar above its corresponding caption. The table of dates is truly functional. Although the space allotted for each day is still quite small, there is enough room to jot down the major events or appointments of the day.
The bigger, the more useful a calendar becomes. Therefore, wall calendars seems to work best. One, which I don't expect to see on the market, is the calendar of the dormant Indonesian news magazine, Tempo. This calendar features the work of the cartoonist Priyanto S., published in the Opini section of the magazine, making it not only practical, but also interesting. This section which first appeared towards the end of 1979, featured the work of Priyanto S. and T. Sutanto. Since 1986, Priyanto's work dominated Opini.
Typically, Tempo's 1996 Opini was filled with sarcastic political humor. For the month of October, for example, the calendar features a cartoon showing five persons, each holding a different newspapers entitled generically as Koran, Suratkabar, Harian, Berita and News, all basically meaning newspaper. One of them looks over another's shoulder and comments, "Funny, the content seems to be all the same in each one, why is that?"
The distribution of this calendar is clearly an effort to remind Tempo's sympathizers that the spirit of Tempo lives on. Although the magazine is still banned, it is ready to awaken any moment their publication permit is reinstalled.
A few years ago, weekly calendar cards placed in music cassette boxes appeared on the market. The format cleverly uses the cassette boxes to display the cards. Flip the plastic cover, and you get a ready-to-use display holder. The drawback with this system is that the plastic cassette casing does not protect the calendar pages from dust.
For the more pragmatic types who have little concern about appearance, even better is the old Chinese calendar, which features a tin panel and a block of paper, one page for each of the 365 days of this year.
Each page features the international date as well as the Javanese, Chinese, and Arabic dates. Some also include the rows of dates and days of the month on the bottom of the page. If you need to write notes, you can fill the entire 12.5 cm by 15.5 cm space of the page! As for the painting on the tin panel, I think that it is a question of taste. If you don't like it, you can always mount the date block on a different panel.
One other calendar which appeared this year was made to be used not only during 1996 but much further in the future. This calendar, entitled Remembrance is a birthday and anniversary reminder which exhibits the artwork by a group of Indonesian women who paint either as a hobby or professionally. While there is nothing new about a birthday calendar, the publication of this calendar makes available a product which has previously been hard to find in this part of the world.
As the fasting month of Ramadhan draws nearer, I have noticed that many shops have started to use Islamic themes. The calendar Writing Traditions of Indonesia features manuscripts in Arabic from the National Library of Indonesia, mostly the holy Koran. Another Lontar product, this calendar appropriately caters to an audience increasingly appreciative of Indonesia's rich cultural heritage.
Another line of calendars presenting Islamic themes has been published by Gema Insani Press. These calendars incorporate the Arabic and international dates in the daily block format. As you tear away each page an excerpt from the holy Koran or a saying based on the Islamic teachings is displayed for the day. The block is appropriately mounted on an attractive panel embellished with decorative Arabic calligraphy.
Again, while there is nothing new, the availability of this calendar offers many more choices to a market that is also becoming more and more diverse in tastes and interests. Can't wait to see what will be in store for next year!