ALholt's 2009 - 2010 Fulbright Research Proposal

Strange Loops: Hybrid Reality in Javanese Culture

I sat in the guest room with my host, Pak Suparman, and drew a picture for him to describe some of my ideas about human nature and reality. Using two overlapping circles, I made a Venn diagram, calling one circle “Nature”, the other “Heaven”, and the place where they overlapped, the phenomenon embodying aspects of both: human beings. The diagram also described another idea, with circles representing “Perceived Tangible Reality”, “Dream Reality”, and where they meet, the place in which both may be experienced. “This is the Javanese way of seeing…” Suparman said excitedly. The simple insight ignited a new level of mutual understanding between us. Not long after, we discussed creating new artworks together, and I respectfully request the support of Fulbright scholarship to allow me to accept his invitation to do so.

Our following conversations centered on the tatal pawukon (tatal = wood, pa + wukon = week calendar), a device expressing time in terms of infinite, cyclical patterns of natural and supernatural forces. Each day reveals an intersecting complex of these energies, expressed in compressed detail as a single symbol carved in a block of wood. The ancient system within which the tatal functions allows the Javanese to navigate phenomenological human experience; it also closely resembles my own concepts of contemporary reality, consciousness and cognition, illuminating issues at the heart of my artistic inquiry. I use hybrids of sculpture, video, multimedia installation and performance to depict relationships between tangible reality and dream reality, the ego and the unconscious self, the natural world and the man-made world. My body of work is a developing system of quasi-functional tools for viewing the tacit matrix that joins these worlds, and for imagining the apparatus that governs them. Studying objects like the tatal, which involve entire communities, I began to ask myself, how might the concepts of traditional Javanese culture inform the development of contemporary interactive art? What might my own skills and practice bring to the innovation of Javanese artforms?

Beginning in March 2008, I spent four-and-a-half months in Solo, Indonesia laying the groundwork for collaborative work with Pak Suparman. I left the US having been granted a Darmasiswa Award from the Indonesian Government and traveled on a Sosial / Budaya visa under the sponsorship of Pak Heri Purwanto. I had met Pak Heri during his lectureship at University of California, Berkeley, where he led its Gamelan Sari Raras, in 2003. While living in his home village of Siwal, my language exchange and cultural dialogue developed into a close relationship of trust with Pak Suparman, former village head and founder / director of Sanggar Purbakayun, an institution for the preservation and innovation of cultural knowledge.

As both a dhalang (shadow puppeteer) and a kyai (shaman), Pak Suparman works at the interface between the natural and supernatural worlds. In a traditional wayang kulit purwa (shadow puppet play), his performance of eight hours or more is intended for the gods. He injects ancient mythological narratives with hilarious satire on current events for a highly interactive human audience. In his ingenious Wayang Kampung Sebelah (WKS) performances, Suparman is able to capture the attentions of gods and mortals with two-hour narratives, woven both with traditional wayang puppets and themes and his own creations, sometimes including puppets of audience members themselves and projected video images of the crowd. Viewer involvement in this mash-up of tropes results in a mirroring and multi-layered distortion of reality. After seeing this iteration of wayang, I longed to occupy this hybrid experience myself, to create contemporary art about my own contemporary existence, and to engage my own audience in the same kind of interactive experience of reality.

In this way, the Javanese view of reality shares borders with science fiction at its most philosophical. The novels of Philip K. Dick explore, in his words, “the irrational, mysterious nature of reality,” using dark humor to pose perennial questions about how we know what Reality and the Truth are, and how we identify ourselves as human. Taking place in a time when the fusion of natural and artificial is an accomplished fact, he addresses the dilemma of dealing with a reality split into indistinguishable likenesses of itself. I find a kindred spirit in Philip K. Dick, whose concepts and work have provided profound inspiration to my art practice for decades. The strength and breadth of my research in Java will benefit from his guidance, as well as that of cognitive scientist Douglas Hofstadter, specifically in his I Am A Strange Loop (2007) and Fluid Concepts and Creative Analogies (1995).

Developing nations like Indonesia can expect to feel the longest lasting impacts of the current global financial crisis. Because the Javanese way of life is caught between the extremes of ubiquitous Western media influences and that of its many conservative Islamic schools (like Ngruki: located within five miles of the village of Siwal, it is run by Jama'ah Islamiyah, the group that claimed responsibility for the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings), I feel an urgent responsibility to contribute to its conservation. While living in Siwal, I taught shadow puppet-making workshops to children in Sanggar Purbakayun, and also sponsored a WKS performance there, which I recorded and had translated for DVD. Through this kind of cultural participation, I aim to encourage traditional practice among local youth when I return.

With Fulbright support for my artistic investigation in Indonesia, I will continue my current exploration of Javanese cultural concepts and cognition, and to apply that knowledge directly to my own art practice. I plan to take part in rituals central to Javanese spiritual practice by invitation of Pak Suparman, both within Solo and in his home village of Wonogiri. I intend to develop new sculptural work, employing local artisans and industries to custom-fabricate parts. I am excited to return to my cultural dialogue and language exchange with Suparman, and to collaborate with him on a WKS performance. Potential exhibition spaces for this include Institut Seni Indonesia, Wisma Seni Taman Budaya Surakarta and Sanggar Purbakayun. A subtitled DVD, to be produced and distributed by the Sublime Frequencies media label, will support my ultimate goal of bringing WKS to the United States for a brief tour. Hertz Hall, University of California, Berkeley; San Francisco State University, San Francisco, CA; Axiom Gallery, Boston, MA; The Middle East, Cambridge, MA; Granoff Music Center, Tufts University, Medford, MA; and the 2011 Boston Cyberarts Festival are among the potential stateside venues.

My participation, dialogue and collaboration in the cultural ecology of a world in which art is both spiritual and scientific, and in which performance is a community affair, will give me the tools to develop interactive dimensions of my artistic practice, to enter a resonant engagement between audience, place and objects while serving the local community.