On finding art and culture (shock) in Yogyakarta, Indonesia

Yep, I know – it’s been an obscenely long time between posts, and obviously much has happened in my world. I thought it best now to focus on my current activities, but I’ll update my other pages shortly with some photo and video content from all the other things I’ve been up to over the last year or so!

Travel life.

At the moment, I am living in Yogyakarta (pronounced “Jogja”), Indonesia. As you may know, I grew up in Jakarta and am half Indonesian, so being back is like slipping into some well-worn comfortable leather shoes that you already know form to your feet. I am a recipient of the Indonesian Arts and Culture Scholarship 2013, on offer from the Indonesian government and Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The purpose of the scholarship is to teach participants from all over the world about Indonesian arts, in one of five different arts centres across the country. My particular program is for “Indonesian diaspora” – people of Indonesian heritage living overseas. We are learning arts (Dayaknese dance from Kalimantan and Javanese dance, a bit of batik and gamelan, traditional Indonesian games), and about Indonesian democracy, Islam and other religions in the region, the role of women in society, economy, and so on. Maybe most importantly, while I already speak bahasa Indonesia, I finally am pushing myself to become more advanced.

Pancasila – the five main principals upon which the daily life of the Republic of Indonesia is based.

Being in Jogja has been absolutely amazing. It is known as the cultural melting pot of Indonesia, as students from all over the country come for the universities here and bring the cultures of their individual regions with them. As a result, a strong scene of  traditional and contemporary art exists here. Basically, the perfect place for me to be in wanting to explore Indonesian art and my own personal practice!

Guide at the Sultan’s Palace of Yogyakarta

Javanese dance classes at the Palace.

So far, I’ve been here a month, and have really taken the time to just immerse myself in anything and everything that’s going on. There are so many potential points of inquiry I’m not even sure where to begin most of the time! I’ve seen amazing art exhibitions, eaten spicy food, been frustrated by Javanese politeness and “saving face”, burnt myself on hot batik wax, driven 60km on the back of a motorbike to find the most perfect beach in a rural part of Java, met incredible new people and started to make plans for moving back here in the future!

Carving leather into wayang kulit.

This is mostly just a big catch up on where I am (lest this post becomes tl;dr), and a few photos of what I’ve been seeing. I’ll post later this week on what I’m looking to focus my artistic inquiries on. Sampai jumpa!

It took over 30km via motorbike over bumpy, broken roads in the middle of rural Java to finally make it to Klayar Beach. Stunning.