Indonesian shadow puppets struggle for encore

Indonesian shadow puppets struggle for encore

Dean Yates, Reuters, Kaliwinonglor, Indonesia

Timbul Hadiprayitno sits behind a white cotton screen, manipulating the limbs of an array of leather puppets and altering his voice to match the characters playing out a centuries-old story.

With lungs that belie his waif-like size, Hadiprayitno chants in ancient Javanese as cigarette smoke drifts over rows of mesmerised faces in a village in the heart of Java, Indonesia's main island and cultural centre.

Throw in Hadiprayitno's 22-member gamelan orchestra of brass instruments and a bright lamp and you have Javanese shadow puppetry, or wayang kulit, at its purest and most elaborate.

Unfortunately for the famed puppet master, most of the faces on the other side of the wide screen watching the shadows act out tales of war and betrayal are old and wizened.

Hadiprayitno, 70, is fighting a losing battle to win young fans and keep alive the ancient tradition, one often used as a metaphor to describe the byzantine and frequently opaque world of Indonesian politics.

The threat to the puppets is not the strengthening of Islamic practises in the world's most populous Muslim country, but rather from MTV and other television.

While that might be expected in urban areas, the intrusion of new ways is just as strong in villages such as Kaliwinonglor, an hour from Yogyakarta city, an ancient royal capital.

"Wayang is out of fashion, it's boring and I don't understand the old Javanese language. It makes me sleepy," said Ramino, 25, as haunting, high-pitched tones from one of Hadiprayitno's four female vocalists echoed over the tin roofs of the village.

Outside a flash new shopping mall in Yogyakarta city, plenty agree.

"I think we should preserve our traditional culture but wayang for the young generation is not interesting. It's less attractive compared with modern culture," said Zaenul Falah, a 21-year-old university dropout.

Wayang was first practised in Java more than 1,000 years ago. The two-dimensional puppets made from buffalo hide and sticks are a mix of the warrior, the grotesque and the comic, representing characters drawn from ancient Hindu traditions that held sway on Java before the arrival of Islam.

Pure wayang sometimes uses sub-plots that touch on contemporary events, although most focus on old stories and use a language that is totally inaccessible to many young Indonesians.

Shadow play has long been a metaphor for Indonesian politics.

Wayang was used in a popular 1983 movie, The Year of Living Dangerously starring Mel Gibson, to illustrate the confusion and struggle for power behind the scenes in the mid-1960s during turmoil that led to the downfall of founding President Sukarno.

The man who eased Sukarno out of power, Soeharto, was often likened to a wayang master because of his skill in playing rivals off against each other. That expertise deserted Soeharto three decades later when Indonesia's economy crashed and students hit the streets, forcing the former general to quit in 1998.

Hadiprayitno grew up in a family in which puppeting goes back generations but he is unsure how long it will last, even though he has 14 children, from three wives, and 24 grandchildren.

Ever chirpy and sporting an impish grin despite the sadness he feels at the decline in classical wayang, Hadiprayitno and other experts said wayang had changed in the past 20 years, drifting toward entertainment produced for mass TV audiences.

"We do live in a modern world...so I urged my children to go to school, to learn. One is a lecturer, although he can still perform wayang," said Hadiprayitno, a puppet master for 50 years.

"The difference is, nowadays, wayang is only seen by the eyes. Wayang in the old days was felt in the heart."

Despite the growing cultural assertiveness of Muslim practises in Indonesia, from increased mosque attendence to more conservative dress, few see that posing a threat to wayang.

Indeed, wayang was vital to spreading Islam when Arab traders arrived in Indonesia centuries ago.

"When Islam came to Indonesia, wayang already existed and it was used as a tool to explain Islam, by using native culture to conceptualise Islam which Javanese would easily comprehend," says Seno Gumira Adjidarma, an expert on Javanese culture, in Jakarta.

Adjidarma disagrees with those who say interest in wayang has dived, pointing out that performances were now shown on television.

"The problem is perhaps the quality, which I think is really declining. Wayang now is just entertainment," he said. PUPPETS AND ROCK BANDS

Didi Yulianto, an executive producer of a weekly wayang programme for Indosiar television station, said he showed classical masters such as Hadiprayitno performing, but he also needed to meet the demands of younger audiences.

This meant modernising shows for an Indosiar programme called "Spectacular Wayang", adding rock bands and female singers who belt out pop music known as dangdut.

"Younger people, such as teenagers, prefer 'Spectacular Wayang' because they want to see rock bands and dangdut singers," said Yulianto, whose show appears three times a month.

At Hadiprayitno's home, the master gazes lovingly at a few puppets he wants to give some air, swirling them around the room. His has more than 600 puppets, some 200 years old.

His performance at Kaliwinonglor village is also breathtaking, even if the language is incomprehensible.

Wearing a purple and black batik shirt and chocolate coloured sarong, and with a Javanese kris, or dagger, tucked into a sash behind his back, Hadiprayitno jerks the limbs of puppets in front of him. The lamp above his head brings their shadows to life on the other side of the white screen.

Constantly refilling his reed-like frame with gulps of air, Hadiprayitno nods his head from side to side each time he changes voice or tones to match the puppet characters.

Shows generally last a whole night, finishing before dawn, and Hadiprayitno still performs 20 times a month.

"I used to do it every night. The voice is good but the body is not so strong," he says, roaring with laughter.

(With additional reporting by Karima Anjani in Jakarta)