sutubabat, Author at Studio Batu

Residual Memory of the Walls harks back to the origins of Singapore as a port city–a place of trade and exchange. It references a time in history when the Former Supreme Court site functioned as a hotel and from its vantage point, occupants encountered the view of the sea and the ships moving in from the Straits of Singapore, finding port at the piers and sailing into the Singapore river. Through the use of sunlight and light-sensitive chemicals to create large cyanotype prints that are signature to Budi Agung Kuswara’s art practice, the artist relates his work to the passing of time on this significant historical site. Combined with the use of archival images, Budi draws upon the residual memories of the buildings and the space they created, capturing the histories that linger. The collaboration between Budi Agung Kuswara and Studio Batu bringing alive the past memories into as if we see it with our own eyes. The work invites audiences to consider our histories as a vanguard for pluralism, a philosophy that recognises and affirms diversity and a peaceful coexistence of peoples and communities of different interests and convictions.

Prelims is the other word for the prelude, initial, the prologue, or foreword to mark the starting point of some sort of journey; be it trip over hundreds of pages of a book or an expedition to the wilderness of artistic exploration. This prelims is part of the later that was intended to become a medium to explore the historical records of rampokan macan—a kind of ceremonies at the courts of 19^th Century Central Javanese rulers on the occasion of the celebration of the end of the fast of Ramadhan. The ceremony displayed an “entertaining” fight between Tiger and Bull.

Based upon the archival research on the topic, Wulang Sunu chooses shadow puppet, video mapping, small figure, and a set of lighting ambience to articulate what he found interesting about the rampokan. This presentation is an attempt to represent stories that revolve around the narrative of rampokan sima. Furthermore, this small project is also intended to ricochet spatter of deeper questions about the unseen rendering of rampogan along with its contemporary context that follows. In the near future, this subject would be reprocessed and presented in a form of visual performance.

HUMBA DREAMS PROJECT adalah catatan pribadi Riri Riza tentang Sumba, khususnya Sumba Timur, dan juga tentang impian dan harapannya akan film. HUMBA DREAMS PROJECT hadir dalam karya lintas medium: Film HUMBA DREAMS. Setelah World Premiere nya di Shanghai International Film Festival 2019, HUMBA DREAMS ditayangkan perdana di Indonesia pada acara JAFF Movie Night 3.2 dan mendapat sambutan hangat dan positif dari teman-teman di Yogya. Selanjutnya, Film HUMBA DREAMS akan ditayangkan di Jakarta.

This is a place

Where the sharpest fangs are in chain

This is a place

Where the light shines on people bid

This is a market

For people with guts

People come for the 3 super rare items, a vitality recipe from the past, a tiger statue from a thug, and a ring with blue sapphire stone. They will bid the best price to get that rare item they wanted to have. There are so many rumors about these items that all that stuff reflecting powers and tragedy simultaneously. Who would get those items?

This visual theatre brings about the performativity of political othering that remains the central form of how human being operates in everyday life either in a high level politics or in a high tensed grass root intrigue. The othering—in that sense—manifest in the body of representation, narrative, and myth that often being nurtured through political power. Through othering, one group is represented as the conveyor of good virtue, while the other is the evil. Yet, at a certain degree, the subject of othering embodies a picture of ambiguity and ambivalence: half evil and half angel. The grand narratives, however, are created through power relations, often times, the imbalanced ones.

We explore that kind of power relation through diverse signification that symbolise either clear-cut picture of othering or rather blurred ones. Tiger in this performance is depicted as ‘a living form that being told as tacky with power, symbol of fear, tragedy, myth as well as mysterious.’ Their existences have always been contingent and depend upon the regime of knowledge they are defined by throughout centuries. Meanwhile, the nature of plurality in Indonesia entails the politics of othering to the discriminated ones. We represent one ethnic that has always been in ambiguous political position. They, in this archipelago, are sometime deemed the tiger of the civilisation; yet looked down as the symbol of tragedy. We pack these narratives into video mapping, script, theatrical act, music, shadows, and puppet.

It’s holiday season in southern coast of Java. A hotel owner orders Marwan and his team to remove the mentally ill people from the streets, and cast them into the forest so they will not disturb the tourist. However, Marwan has another plan.

Diah takes Jarwo in a warehouse during the lunch break . She said she needed money quickly. She offers Jarwo to buy a match for 10,000 rupiahs.

A visual artist, Iyok Suntari created 3 installations from radio, gramophones, unused circuit, and light bulb for his lover in the past. In the middle of the completion of his work, Iyok collapsed and died in a night when his gastritis became worse. The works were abandoned, until a group of young artists found the dusty and abandoned installations. They also found Iyok’s notebook and from that notebook these young artist got the inspiration to continue Iyok’s works. By using those 3 installations, the audience will follow the stories of Iyok’s past love story. In the middle of the play the ghost of Iyok Suntari appear to commemorate the dusty love story.

While You’re Away try to deliver a story about remembering and journey. The play uses the old Indonesian music from the 60’s – 80’s era and some old tunes to captivate the tone of sonic experience from the past. The shadow puppet becomes the medium to depict the past, while the video mapping is the depiction of the memory that still linger.