In the shadow of the epics
With Muslim puppeteers and audiences and tales from Hindu mythology, Wayang Kulit is a tangible manifestation of Indonesia’s pluralism.
PALLAVI AIYAR-July 20, 2013
King Jarasandha of Giribajra Kingdom on the screen.
The audience numbered in the hundreds: mechanics and small retailers, office workers and academics, mingled as they squatted or stretched out on the dry lawn in front of the stage. Women wearing headscarves cradled children on their laps, whorls of spicy smoke floating above them, as their husbands chain-smoked clove cigarettes.
The audience numbered in the hundreds: mechanics and small retailers, office workers and academics, mingled as they squatted or stretched out on the dry lawn in front of the stage. Women wearing headscarves cradled children on their laps, whorls of spicy smoke floating above them, as their husbands chain-smoked clove cigarettes.It was ten at night on a Thursday in South Tangerang, a suburb of Jakarta, and it wasn’t a popular band or comedian that the crowds had gathered to watch but rather, an extraordinary classical art form called wayang kulit. This is an Indonesian shadow puppet performance wherein ancient stories from the Ramayana and Mahabharata are brought to silhouetted life on a screen, using backlit figures cut from raw buffalo hide.
