Phenomenology of a Puppet Theatre by Jan Mrázek--wayang scholar, puppeteer, and faculty member at the University of Singapore--contributes a fascinating perspective on Javanese shadow theatre by examining, through the theory of phenomenology, wayang media and their interaction in performance. Wayang is a dramatic art that involves puppets, actors, singers, and instrumental musicians in reenacting stories from Javanese and Hindu epics and commenting upon Javanese daily life. Wayang kulit is a shadow theatre that employs flat puppets intricately carved from water buffalo hide. The puppets are operated by a dalang (puppeteer, spelled dhalang in Mrázek’s book) who works behind a translucent cloth screen, in front of and underneath an electric lamp, to cast the puppets’ shadows on the opposite side of the screen. Accompanying musicians help present the mood, puppet characters, and plots of the stories depicted.
Mrázek considers an ideal encounter with and appreciation of wayang. The author states, “My aim is to understand, to let be seen, what actually goes on: the material things, visual images, sounds…how these are worked with, related together and built up into a structure, how they function in that structure, how they are made sense of and how they affect people, the ways in which they evoke associations and present physical sensations” (1). This statement implies the phenomenological approach from which he draws: that which concerns a sensual encounter with an object. This phenomenology of perception is derived from the work of philosophers Merleau-Ponty, Hegel, and Heidegger. Mrázek focuses on the performance--what happens during performance and what is represented--rather than on artist or audience interpretations or previous scholarship on wayang. Javanese interpretation of wayang, with which he has engaged in his ethnographic research and library research and as a wayang performer, directly informs his perspective. Mrázek draws from other perspectives to build his argument, including phenomenological analyses of visual art (Dewey; Arnheim), sound and film studies (Chion), and works on the social constitution of artistic meaning (Keeler; Becker; Lysloff), and the construction of meaning (Barthes). He further engages with dramaturgical theory (Artaud; Shechner; Garner) and Indonesian scholarship on Javanese performing arts (Abbas and Subro; Djojowidagdo; Suratno).
While it is not the book’s purpose to provide an overview of wayang theatre, the opening section includes an introduction to wayang that allows a reader unfamiliar with this genre to appreciate the subsequent chapters. For the remainder of the book Mrázek applies phenomenology to wayang kulit. The first five chapters focus on individual media in wayang, beginning in chapter 1 with the puppet. Mrázek outlines the “being” of the wayang puppet--its look, meaning, character--as pictorial representation and representational tool in theatrical performance. This chapter also includes an introduction to the dalang’s role. The second chapter focuses on the creation of pictorial moments (moments without movement) on the space of the screen. Chapter 3 examines the nature and meaning of puppet and dalang movement. Chapters 4 and 5 focus on wayang music and other sound qualities through music’s dramatic function and the speaking voices of the puppets and the dalang. Chapter 6 brings together the previously examined media to make sense of performance.
The book’s last two chapters examine context for performance. In chapter 7, Mrázek argues that “what is happening off the screen affects, and is often an integral part of, what is happening on the screen” (323). He moves away from the ideal performance to examine an atypical performance in Solo in order to elucidate the impact of context on performance and vice versa. The remainder of this chapter focuses on the space “around the screen” as a space for “human encounters” (346): attendance of wayang is understood as a means of idealizing social connectedness. The concluding chapter, previously published in the journal Indonesia, examines the clown scenes and humor in wayang, as well as innovations in performance and the interaction of wayang with modern communications media. Here, Mrázek incorporates performer and audience reflections and interpretations with the intention of highlighting the diverse ways people respond to artistic innovations. The chapter concludes with a postscript in which Mrázek examines wayang during the period of reformasi in Indonesia.
Additional features of the book include an appendix with a key to musical notation and a thorough index. Illustrative photographs provide additional contextual information and are accompanied by explanatory captions.
Mrázek’s seminal contribution is to consider each major component of wayang and how the components interact, rather than to focus on a single element, such as the dalang’s role, puppet’s iconography, or music’s function. He argues, “To understand any of the components, and to understand the performance as a whole, they have to be studied in relation to each other and in relation to the whole” (1). The work is a testament to the utility of an interdisciplinary approach, especially for examining a multimedia form like wayang. The author’s application of phenomenology indicates a grasp of the theory’s potential by demonstrating its usefulness for understanding performance as perceived. This work does not address phenomenological sociology. Rather, Mrázek utilizes phenomenology as it was first outlined by philosophers. Knowledge of philosophical works on phenomenology is recommended for appreciating Mrázek’s argument. The author does not seek to interpret wayang plots; therefore, a scholar interested in textual interpretation of narrative material is advised to examine other texts. Finally, Mrázek seeks to contribute an understanding of shadow theatre traditions and, more broadly, representation in human works, arguing that how something is represented impacts what is represented: “Since any representation is a matter of focusing on certain characteristics of what is represented and ignoring others, of bringing out certain qualities and leaving others out of the picture, the manner of representation affects what exactly is represented” (299). Art historians, anthropologists, folklorists, and ethnomusicologists interested in the phenomenology of perception, especially those who work on Indonesian performing arts, will be interested in this text.
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[Review length: 967 words • Review posted on November 28, 2007]