wayang kulit



sat through a cool 2 hour performance of traditional Javanese Wayang Kulit at Fort Canning tonight, with jumbo flies buzzing around after the evening rain adding to the atmosphere..

i've never seen a real performance of wayang kulit before and was hence surprised to discover that the majority of the audience actually sits behind the puppet master (dalang) and his team of singers and gamelan assembly, rather than in front of the stage, i.e. the screen onto which the shadows are cast. It is almost as if the audience is sitting backstage or something.. haha.. :p The flat, elaborately cut-out wooden puppets are also beautifully-painted (probably for the sake of the audience behind the screen) and a lot of fighting, punching and jumping takes place, while the singers sing and the gamelans gong.

i like the effect when the dalang pull the puppets away from the screen rather than across 'cos it makes them larger and more intimidating, and they have a ring of lighter shadow (aura) around them, which reminds me of the gaussian blur effect in photoshop - which is one of my favourite filters... err... durrh... :p