Reviewed by Justene Knight and Eddy Knight, Wednesday 27th October 2021.
Perahu-Perahu, which is Indonesian for boats, takes the audience on a sensory journey of light, image, and sound. Wayang kulit is a traditional form of puppet theatre, where light and shadow join with sound to create the stories of our dreams and our realities. In its traditional form, it uses flame and a screen between the performers and the audience. In this production, Indonesian Australian artist, Jumaadi, and his collaborators use dual overhead projectors and coloured lighting gels to re-imagine this art form and take it to an exquisite level. The lighting design was by Susan Grey Gardner.
Over the course of an hour, the audience is taken on a journey, where boats are at the heart of a contemporary multilayered story of everyday life, food, climate change, pandemics, work, loss, and love.
Co-director and principal artist, Jumaadi, and
co-director and musical director, Michael Toisuta, are joined by three amazing and versatile musicians, Sawung Jabo, Mick Stuart, and Kyati Suharto, and two superb shadow-makers, Julia Westwood and Maki Ogawa. At times, I would forcibly drag myself out of the story simply for the joy of watching the utter skill of this collaborative group of talented performers working together, the way they watched each other, focusing on the cues of body and sound to adapt and meld their talents into the dreamscape unfolding on the screens.
The live soundscape of spoken and sung word and multiple instruments wove through the shadow-puppets, at times fading almost to a heartbeat that is felt before heard and, at other times, taking centre stage, exploding with joy and leading the shadows in their dance across the screens.
Although the production technology has been updated, and the ancient tales of heroes, gods, and demons are done away with, this is still a form of the traditional storytelling which is at the heart of wayang kulit, which a dalang (puppeteer) and a small entourage would take from village to village. As well as popular entertainment, it is used as a vehicle for education, and a means of commentating on contemporary life. As well as a rousing pineapple wedding, jokes about durians, and puppets being swallowed by crabs, there is mention of the shipwreck of the Dutch ship Batavia, mirroring stories of refugee boats sinking on their way here, with hundreds drowning, facts about how many cattle are yearly shipped to Indonesia from Australia, as well as Australians' thoughts about abattoir practices. There is also a puppet who wanders across the screens carrying a syringe for vaccinations, while bodies pile up.
The performance is thought-provoking, often slyly funny, and always interesting. I may not have always understood exactly what I was seeing at all moments but, in the end, that is part of the magic. In a world where we are so often provided with stories that show us exactly what to know, having a performance to watch that will linger on in my dreams and my thoughts for days is a rare and wonderful treat. Go and see it
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