Tejakula performances reveal unknown layer of cultural life
Tejakula performances reveal unknown layer of cultural life
Benito Lopulalan, Contributor, Tejakula, Buleleng
Has anyone ever heard about Tejakula in Bali?
On the map, Tejakula is an isolated dot midway on the dry
coastal road from Singaraja in the north of Bali to Karangasem
regency in the east of the island.
A few aficionados of Balinese culture will tell you that it is
home to Bali's most famous wayang wong: a classical dance
featuring Rama and the monkey kings of the Ramayana epic.
But the beach is dull and apart from its isolated location,
there is apparently little else to enjoy. It is a place few
people would select for the holding of a cultural event.
Yet one of the most interesting events Bali has staged
recently took place there last Saturday. A theatrical performance
called Persamuan Samudra Giri (Encounter of Sea and Earth)
brought together itinerant artists from Java, a theater group
from Denpasar and local village artists.
It took place at the Taman Seni Cili Mas, a park that houses a
combination of beach bungalows and a cultural center. It was set
up by Nyoman Tusan, Bali's first modernist painter, who dreamed
of bringing combining the creativity of Balinese tradition with
that of contemporary art.
The itinerant artists were invited by the Tejakukus Foundation
of Tejakula, and the Dharma Nature Time, a Bali-based art
association.
The event was particularly interesting in the way it revealed
the existence of a virtually unknown layer of Indonesian cultural
life, in this case, that of the itinerant artists.
Take for example the choice of venue.
So as to cater to the needs of urban readers, the media tends
to cover events at prestigious venues like galleries and museums
based on the assumption that these are the lifeblood of the art
market, and unfortunately pay little attention to people who
purposefully position themselves outside the mainstream.
The itinerant artist tradition, however, harks back far into
the past to the wandering warriors of the wayang stories and the
wandering "students of wisdom" of the Javanese epic recorded in
the Serat Centini.
But today's wandering artists are not merely searching for
spiritual enlightenment.
Winarcho, 41, one of the invited artists, explained, "When I
enter a village, I usually live among the local people for
several weeks or months before I do an installation event with
them, bringing together ceremony and ecology, and thus creating a
kind of new awareness among the local people."
To these artists, therefore, the notion of "art" and the
recognition it entails are irrelevant. What matters is
"communication". Their "action" negates all boundaries, be they
between art genres, between "art" and "non-art", and between
social classes.
It is an attempt at reestablishing primeval unity. Cultural
encounters are sometimes organized where these artists meet other
artists with similar leanings, far from the beaten path, far from
the art-lover crowds of elite tastes and postures, and with no
other spectators than dumbfounded villagers from the surrounding
area.
In Tejakula, the three itinerant artists from Java --
Winarcho, Oentong Nugroho, and Adji Nugroho -- combined their
action with Teater Got from Denpasar, under the direction of
Agung Eksa.
It started with an installation-cum-performance of the Teater
Got. Cardboard puppets were placed in a semicircle on the sand of
the beach as in preparation of a primitive religious rite.
The performers, their bodies painted in earthy colors, then
surged in slow motion from the sand where they had been lying, as
if they were being born from the clay of the earth.
The spectators -- village children and young people -- watched
in respectful silence, as if witnessing a ritual to honor the
earth goddess, Pertiwi.
Then, one of the actors picked up a hammer, and with slow
gestures, repeatedly hit a big stone, symbolizing Man's burden of
work and labor. As he was doing so, other actors were slowly
standing up and moving forward, uttering mantraic exclamations
and poems.
Then the actors all stood up, walking slowly, a crowd of
gleeful youth in tow, heading in silence for the village one
kilometer away. Then they walked back to a different part of the
beach, where installations from the wandering artists waited for
them.
They ended their journey with a ritual bath in the sea, which
symbolizing the rediscovery of harmony with the earth and the
sea.
Just by the sea, a small river had dried up leaving a pool
behind, and it was here that Winarcho, Oentong Nugroho and Adji
Nugroho presented their show.
Their theme was unity, the encounter of sea and earth, river
and sea, sea and river, light and night, and Man with all of
these.
Just by the beach, Oentong had made a small pyramid of stones.
Nearby, Winarcho had hung a big stone from ropes over the small
river, adding a dimension of air, while up the river bed, Adji
Nugroho had created imaginary objects from roots and twigs.
They would have all remained mere installations though if life
hadn't been suddenly instilled into them.
Indeed, it was sunset, and as darkness slowly enveloped the
sea, river and trees, lines of flickering candles little by
little appeared, and suddenly, a thundering howl came from the
sea: Winarcho standing there, shrouded in a white cloth that grew
darker with the waning of the sun.
Then, still howling, he wobbled out from the sea and into the
waiting pool, placing a light just below the hanging stone. With
no other spectators than this writer and a couple of friends from
Denpasar, Winarcho was creating his own ritual encounter between
Man and Nature.
Thank goodness, even as mass culture spreads everywhere, there
still remain people who are able to recreate the spell of human
primeval calls.
Then followed a creation by local Tejakula artists, Mr. and
Mrs Dewi, featuring the union of Baruna -- the Ocean god -- and
Pertiwi.
Held on the beach at night, and consisting of a dance
performed in "shadows" from behind a wayang screen, as children
sung and danced the kecak and jangger in front, it was yet
another homage to the soul of nature.
Hopefully, the spirit that has animated this Samudra Giri
event will continue inspiring the public. The point is, artists
do not need exposure nor spectators when haunted by the presence
of Nature.