Culture counts: What price for the arts in our lives?

Culture counts: What price for the arts in our lives?

Stevie Emilia, The Jakarta Post/Jakarta

The 4th Art Summit Indonesia 2004 International Festival on
Contemporary Performing Arts and Visual Arts opened on Saturday,
an event boasting the scheduled participation of renowned artists
from 14 countries.

Although there are fears Thursday's fatal bombing in Kuningan,
South Jakarta, might cause cancellations by some foreign
performers, the event could be just what the country needs to
show its real, better side, especially in its aims of promoting
peace and bridging intercultural differences.

"So far I've heard nothing," the art summit's chairman of the
artistic board Putu Wijaya said on Thursday night when asked
about cancellations.

"But of course, the organizer would take (good) care of
security because we have foreign guests."

Unfortunately, although the event allows art lovers the chance
to wallow in a month-long cultural treat, most people are still
unaware of what is going on.

"I don't know about it, but then I'm more a movie person,"
Agus W., a teller in a private bank, said reluctantly.

With so few major festivals around -- the most notable popular
events include the Gedung Kesenian Jakarta International Festival
and the JakArt Festival -- tickets for the upcoming art summit
should have sold out long before it even started.

But festivals rely mostly on the support of loyal supporters
-- especially foreign cultural centers, local artists, corporate
sponsors, patrons, institutions and volunteers. With little
interest displayed in the festival, and the limited budget
available, some may be asking if it's worthwhile to go on with
the show in the future.

Art observer Amir Sidharta said cultural festivals should
receive full support at all levels because quality cultural life
was important to ensure people recognized they were civilized,
cultured individuals, not only born to work and make money.

"So, arts events enrich us culturally, making us more
sensitive, critical and capable of seeing things from different
angles ... Thus arts events are very important," said Amir.

The festivals are also considered as a window into world
happenings, as well as to help balance the rapid development of
the more popular entertainment industry that, according to Putu
Wijaya, "insulted" people's creative minds.

"Unfortunately, not all people are willing to take advantage
of this kind of event although prices of the entrance tickets are
not as high as a movie ticket," he said.

For example, ticket for a show by San Kai Jo Ku, which would
cost Rp 1 million in Japan, is only Rp 20,000 here.

He expressed confidence that the public's lack of interest in
arts festivals could be overcome by "motivating them to include
arts festivals as part of their needs, at least once in three
years".

Yet it's a goal that might take years to accomplish, because
one cannot force-feed such events, and their importance, to a
resistant public.

Professional dancer Restu Imansari Kusumaningrum of the Bali
Purnati Center for the Arts, an institution that focuses on
Central and East Indonesia, noted that the lack of interest in
the arts could also be seen in the decrease in the number of
students in art disciplines, especially dance, music and theater.

She also cited the poor financial assistance for the
development and preservation of arts.

"The absence of a good education syllabus in elementary
education (is also responsible) too, because the teachers do not
possess adequate skills (to teach art appreciation)," said the
woman, who played a major part in bringing the avant-garde
production I La Galigo to the international stage.

Inspired by the 14th century Bugis epic poem Sureq Galigo, the
production, which brought together theater, dance music and
poetry into stage, was successfully premiered in the 2,000-seat
Theater at the Esplanade in Singapore in March before going on a
world tour. There are plans to stage it in Jakarta, but no date
has been set.

She also highlighted the demands of urban living, with people
wanting convenient consumerism without wishing to create or
interact with others or explore culture, for the lack of interest
in the arts festivals.

"So, there's not much growth in the number of the audience and
arts supporters. Arts appreciation of urban people is limited.
Desire to become a part of cultural life or the number of people
who care and are aware of cultural preservation is very low."

She said the phenomenon arose during the authoritarian
Soeharto regime, which spanned the mid-1960s to 1998, with people
more interested in their own concerns.

"On the other hand, the creators and the art form developed
at a slow pace in this country. It's very ironic," Restu said.
"But if there's someone now who is still thinking that arts
festivals are a waste of money, it means we're declining even
further ..."

So is the answer for the arts festivals to take it to the
masses by following popular forms?

Putu stated that festival organizers should not compromise
their aims to follow commercial trends because the events would
lose their meaning.

"An entertaining festival can be organized to lighten up the
moment, but a festival (like the art summit), with 'the latest
and the best' as its criteria, should be purely that."

In other words, if there is not the necessary support, all we
will have to watch is the Britney Spears of this world, as a
colleague remarked, or those second-billing performers willing to
brave our cultural wasteland.