Wayang Kulit Performance and History of Pre-Cinema: Inquiring Archaeology of Projection and Screen

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Wayang Kulit Performance and History of
Pre-Cinema Inquiring Archaeology of Projection
and Screen

• By Ekky Imanjaya Film program
• BINUS INTERNATIONAL

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Pay attention to the projections and screens
  within the examples
• Platos Cave The very first prototype of cinema,
  with simple cinematic apparatus
• Screen
• Projection
• spectators

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research
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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Karagoz from Turkey

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Ombres Chinoises
• (Chinese Shadow)

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Magic Lantern

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• Magic Lantern

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Phantasmagoria

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Camera
• Obscura

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Muybridges Cronophotography
• Phenakistoscope

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• Thaumascope
• Zoopraxiscope

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Media Archaeologys Object of Research

• Anything but (Javanese and Balinese) Wayang Kulit
  Performance?
• ? Wayang Cinema
• Layar Tancap
• Layartancap.com ?
• Indonesias Youtube

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Media Archaelogist

• Elsaessers
• For the history of early cinema in expanded
  field can, as indicated, provide many names of
  inventors, showmen, and bricoleurs, whose ways of
  thinking about moving images, about
  sound-and-image combinations, about simultaneity
  and interactivity landed them in dead-ends, at
  least from the retrospective teleology of the
  traditional birth of cinema (Elsaesser 2005,
  22).

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Media Archaeologist

• Elsaesser
• In old film history, the history was written by
  the winners only. But in so-called new film
  history, the losers can once more have a place,
  and even rediscover losers in the past who turn
  out to have become if not the winners, then the
  great-grandfathers of the winners (Elsaesser
  2005, 22).

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Media Archaeologist

• Edwin S Porter vs D.W. Griffith (Noel Burchs
  1978 essay)
• Edison or Lumiere ? the headline of Der Komet,
  September 26, 1896
• Lumiere Brothers The Father of Documentary or
  The Father of Documentary?
• How about Skladanowsky, Oscar Messter (Germany),
  William Friese Greene (Britain), Francis Jenkins,
  Latham family (USA), etc?

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Elsaessers and Wayang

• One of the most persistent assumptionsand
  perhaps the foundational gesture on which all
  histories of the cinema has been basedis that of
  inevitability of cinema. Like a baton relay, or
  the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, from Platos
  parable of cave and Balinese shadow-plays, from
  Leonardostudies of water in motion to Albertis
  treatise on the laws of perspective, from camera
  obscuras and mechanical drawing aids to magic
  lanterns, fog pictures and fantasmagorias, from
  dioramas and phenakistoscopes to thaumatropes and
  chronophotography, historians have beet at pains
  to line up, indifferently, philosophical
  speculation, scientific experiments, aids to
  observation and drawing as well as optical toys,
  in order to give the appearance of logic and
  cogency to the cinemas creation myth the moment
  when on Marc 21st 1895 the Lumiere Brothers
  projected their first film.(Elsaesser and
  Hoffman 1997, 46).

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Wayang Kulit Media Archaeology

• No appropriate research and exploration on Wayang
  Kulit performance

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The Questions

• To what extent can we consider Wayang Kulit
  Performance as Part of pre-Cinema History?
• Focus Projection and Screen
• Wayang kulit performance vs Layar Tancap

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Theories

• Terry Castle Phantasmagoria Spectral
  Technology and the Metaphorics of Modern Reverie
• broadening meaning of Phantasmagoria as mental
  activity and a cultural practice, and
  psyhological term
• The importance role of projection in
  Phantasmagoria

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Phantasmagoria

• - as a cultural practice
• - as a mental and physical activity
• - as a theoretical concept in psychoanalysis

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Theories

• Lev ManovicTowards an Archaeology
• of the Computer Screen
• 3 types of Screen
• Classical screen a flat, rectangular surface
• dynamic screen cinema, television, video
• real-time screen radar, video live
• The idea of temporality classical a static
  permanent image dynamic moving image of the
  past real-time shows the present
• relation between the space of the viewers and
  the space of representation

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Wayang Kulit At Glance

• Definition
• - Shadow
• - Ghost
• - Imagination
• - Puppet
• Wayang Kulit
• ?The Puppet made of
• Leather
• ? The Performance of Shadow Play

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Definition

• made of leather
• manipulated with sticks or buffalo horn handles.
• cast using an oil lamp or, in modern times, a
  halogen light, onto a cotton cloth background.
• Associated with gamelan drum music
• A performance last all night long, or until
  dawn.
• UNESCO Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible
  Heritage of Humanity on November 7, 2003.

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Wayang Kulit at Glance

• gtThe shadow theatre has existed, in the lands
  between Turkey and China.
• Indonesian shadow puppet performances originated
  in India
• Came to Bali from Java between the 11th and 14th
  centuries.
• An 11th century Balinese royal inscription
  mentions a wayang performance.
• Earliest record Central Java, 907 AD with story
  Bimmaya Kumara (Claire Holt, Art in Indonesia, p
  128)
• gt In Bali, Wayang Kulit performances are sacred
  and form part of many ceremonies in village and
  family temples.
• 3 functions instructive, entertaining and
  religious.
• Chinkah in Bali in 1846. The king of Klungkung
  gave a performance for him.

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Archaeology of Projection

• Blencong the Lamp

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Archaeology of Projection

• dhalang manipulates the puppets, making them
  closer or farer from the lamp to create
  particular special effects
• In phantasmagoria the figures move back or
  forward toward the projection.

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Platos Cave, Phantasmagoria, Wayang Kulit Show,
Modern Cinema

• -
• projected in the darkened space
• revealing a narrative about
• another world in another space
• Which has a direct bearing on
• the here and now
• (The Cinematic Mystical Gaze The Films of Peter
  Weir,
• Richard James Leonard, Cinema Studies Program,
• University of Melbourne)

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Wayang, Cinema, and Modern World

• In Malaysia
• gt Wayang Film
• Pawagam Panggung, Wayang,
• Gambar
• (Stage, Shadow, and Image)
• Cinema

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Archaeology of Screen

• Screen in Wayang Kulit shows varies greatly in
  size

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Manovich's Theory on screen

• Screen in Wayang Kulit
• A usual screen display in, a flat,rectangular
  surface, intended for frontal viewing Classical
  Screen
• it can displays images changing over time
  Dynamic screen
• it is more closer to television viewing than
  cinema viewing the show can become a social
  gathering, the spectators can choose either to
  completely merge with the screens space or do
  any other activities (chatting, smoking,etc)
• doesnt fit real-time screen

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Manovich's Theory on Screen

• Wayangs screen does not fit any of the
  definitions
• It is not permanently set in a building. Dhalang
  can set-up the mobile screen anywhere, as
  requested by the host
• the spectators can watch both sides of the
  screen
• spectators are not always immobile or imprisoned
  in a viewing situation
• Other theory the PRIMITIVE period the viewers
  were free to interact, come, go,and maintain a
  psychological distance from the cinematic diegesis

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Tanceb concept

• similar with Layar Tancap (mobile cinema
  show/outdoor cinema).

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Layar Tancap

• older than (indoor) cinema)
• The name layar tancap was adopted for
  Indonesias Youtube www.layartancap.com
• Wayang Kulits screen as the ancestor of Layar
  Tancap?

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Layar Tancap vs Wayang Kulit show

• Both have tanceb concept
• Both are not shown in a fixed building
• Boths Spectators can watch both side of the
  screen
• Both are elements of
• a larger celebration

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Layar Tancap vs Wayang Kulit show

• Both can be
• considered as social/
• political gathering
• Golkar Partys celebration!

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Clip

• Wayang Kulit Performance the projection and the
  screen

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Conclusion

• new film history makes
• film scholars explore the
• possibilities of the
• untouchable and unthinkable zones
• Wayang vs Phantasmagoria
• ?the meaning of wayang is broadened
• Have similarity on how the projection works

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Conclusion

• Wayangs screen does not entirely fit with
  Manovics definitions on screen
• It has its own kind of type
• It is similar with the screen of Layar Tancap

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Conclusion

• Wayang Kulit as one of the grandfathers
• of modern cinema

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• Thank You