CONTEMPORARY WAYANG

CLASH OF GENERATIONS

     In this project, I decided to further investigate my local shadow puppetry called wayang kulit. I aimed to reform the way our shadow play  is conducted in addition to preserving the traditional aspects of the play. I first studied the traditional wayang characters derived from both the Javanese and Kelantanese wayang figure.

    After that, I met an artist that use pop characters such as Ironman and Batman as a character for the shadow plays. Inspired by Tintoy Chuo, I made a drawing of a figure resembling Donald Trump. The figure is named Menteri Meme or translated as the Meme Minister as he became a famous popular figure in the world ranging from the Internet's memes to games.

A-Level Art - Preparatory drawing, Pen on paper

    After finishing the base design for the puppet I wanted to create, I then begin the puppet creation process.

A-Level Art - Preparatory works

    Since getting an animal hide is difficult to obtain, I used model board as the base of the puppet as it is not flimsy and easily torn. Using a different sized bolts and various points of chisels, motifs on the puppet are made by punching the tools using a mallet. The motifs are needed to be cut and knocked properly as not all the motifs desired is according to the chisels head shape. This process is repeated until the all the motifs needed are done. After that, the puppet is coloured with acrylic paint as the gloss from acrylics made the colour appeal.

FINAL RESULT

A-Level Art - Final artwork, Mixed media

    This is the finished product of the puppet Menteri Meme. Above is a pair of traditional and contemporary puppets that I made. I projected the shadow of the puppets that I made on mahjong paper to see how can these two figure affect and differ from the traditional shadow play. Using popular characters as the identity of the puppet can attract many young generations to be informed and curious on this dying tradition. People nowadays especially in Malaysia are detached from this tradition as most of the wayang story does not relate to the people today. Hence, the initiative to revive this heritage is by making something they can relate to. Through the introduction of the popular and contemporary figures, there is a hope for this cultural practice to prosper and retained in the traditions of the people especially the Malays as that is the aim of this project.