(2010-03-03)
Women Making New Home on Indonesia's Stages

Excerpt from article by Alia Swastika, The Jakarta Globe, February 23rd 2010

Juggling a marriage and children with the hectic world of art direction and choreography could exhaust anyone’s creative flame. The long nights of rehearsals, the binding schedules butting up against anachronistic taboos and outdated social constructions can weigh heavy on the artistic mind.

While female artists like Retno Maruti, Gusmiati Suid and Elly Luthan have emerged from Indonesia and gone on to be recognized around the world for their talents and contributions to the stage, the number of women choreographing the country’s dance recitals or directing the nation’s plays pales in comparison to that of their male counterparts.

After recognizing the limited number of female artists who have been awarded arts and theater grants in Indonesia, in 2006 the Jakarta-based Kelola foundation and the Dutch nongovernmental organization HIVOS initiated a program called Empowering Women Artists (EWA). The program aimed to encourage and enable female artists to devote themselves to their craft.

Kelola’s programs provide female Indonesian visual artists with opportunities to improve their skills and knowledge, as well as the chance to broaden their network of contacts in the national and international arts communities.

For the program, Kelola and HIVOS selected three promising artists to support over a three-year period: Hartati, a choreographer from Jakarta; Tya Setyawati, a theater director from Padang, West Sumatra; and Shinta Febriany, a theater director from Makassar. The next three years saw the three women produce nine performances between them.

A Feminine Approach to a Masculine World

“I don’t feel any limitations in terms of my identity as a woman, regarding the creative process in my theater,” Shinta Febriany said.

“Sometimes we had training or rehearsal until midnight, and for the first few years I had to convince my family to let me do this. But, of course, after the negotiation it went very smoothly.”

While theater in Makassar remains a male-dominated environment, Shinta’s peers recognized her talents as a director early on in her career.

Produced with Sanggar Merah Putih, (Red and White Studios), Shinta’s play “namaku adam tanpa huruf kapital” (“my name is adam without capital letters”), which centered around established gender roles within households, earned the respect of audiences in Makassar and theater critics throughout Indonesia.

The play used little dialogue, instead relying on the body language and movements of its three male actors and two female actresses. It revolved around everyday tasks that are stereotypically assigned to the one gender — shaving, baking, cleaning and cooking.

Along with her EWA fellowship, Shinta, now a leading figure in Makassar theater, was awarded a grant by the Japan Foundation in 2000 to visit and observe the theater scene in Tokyo and other cities throughout Japan.

Tya Setyawati, a 32-year-old mother of three, has vowed never to give up her love of the theater.

Tya has taken two productions, “Bumi Perempuan” (“Mother Earth”) and “Dekonstruksi Perawan” (“Virgin Deconstruction”), from Padang to other parts of Indonesia.

“Human body [language] is the most genuine language, that’s the reason I prefer to explore it,” Tya said. “Somehow I want to free the body from social constructions and restrictions in terms of taboos and politeness.”

Her husband and manager, Enrico Alamo, also has a strong interest in the theater.

“I’m lucky to be married to a man who shares the same passion for the arts,” she said. “My own strong will also keeps me moving, no matter how difficult any given situation is.”

Tya arranges her rehearsals close to her house in order to optimize her free time.

She leaves her children with family members while she runs rehearsals.

Hartati, a 43-year-old mother of two who lives in Jakarta, needed to overcome common problem faced by people in the capital. Her house in Depok is 90 minutes from the studio she uses at the Jakarta Arts Institute.

Hartati is one of the most recognized choreographers in Indonesia, with many international achievements under her belt. She received a grant from the Asian Cultural Council exchange project in the United States in 2000, and has staged her works in a number of US cities. In 2007, she was part of Point to Point, an international collaborative project between dancers and choreographers organized by the Asia-Europe Foundation.

“My daughter loves dancing, too,” Hartati said. “She has been studying ballet for over four years. Sometimes she comes with me and watches me at rehearsal. She knows I love what I am doing and supports me for that.”

Hartati, who was married to Boy G Sakti, a choreographer from the Gumarang Sakti Dance Company, gave up her career as a choreographer in 2004 to focus on being a mother. But the urge to create could not be ignored.

She came out of retirement two years later to join the EWA program.

“In 2006, I gave up my marriage and started to work in the theater again,” Harati said. “That was when I joined the EWA program.”

Last March, as part of the program, she went to the village of Kotoanau, in Solok, West Sumatra, where she learned silat harimau and silat mancak , which are body movements based on martial-arts styles.

For Hartati, her residency among the villagers took her out of her comfort zone and gave her the opportunity to grow as a dancer and choreographer.

“For two weeks, I lived with the villagers who practice those movements as part of their daily life and I learned how to live with them. I realized the value of getting out of my comfort zone and opening myself to new adventure and growth,” she said.

Full article please visit http://www.thejakartaglobe.com/lifeandtimes/women-making-new-home-on-indonesias-stages/360313

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