“In the light of the full moon, our bodies will join as one in celebration of our sacred love tonight … and this very moment, may we conceive the life, who will one day defend justice for our people,” Raden Mas Said sang with passion in Javanese to his lovely bride, Rubiyah, also known as Matah Ati, on their first night.
She responded with equal devotion: “My husband, tonight I am your wife, take me… I am all yours, my beloved prince.”
Then a spectacular play of lights lingered on this amorous scene, dimming slowly and eventually faded into darkness. At this point, the audience enthusiastically applauded, followed by cries of “Bravo!” and a standing ovation as the curtain dropped displaying the giant Mangkunegaran royal crest with “Indonesia” written in bold red letters underneath.
The act, the closing scene of the Javanese opera Matah Ati, recently featured at Singapore’s Esplanade Theatre, stirred emotions of the audience.
The show noticeably awakened pride and nationalism in Indonesian viewers, who mostly took time to fly to Singapore to watch the performance and who comprised about a third of the audience.
This masterpiece of Indonesian cultural heritage was introduced to an international audience by no less than Princess Atilah Soeryajaya, the granddaughter of Mangkunegaran VII of the Surakarta palace in Central Java during its two-day world premiere on Oct. 22 and Oct. 23 as part of Singapore’s annual Malay arts festival, the Pesta Raya.
A dancer and a stage performer in her own right, Atilah chose to take on the role of writer and director for this art piece.
For the performance, she collaborated with two equally impassioned and accomplished artists in both the country’s arts and culture scene and international community — photographer-artistic director Jay Subiyakto and painter-designer Sri Astari Rasjid.
For all three and the cast of hundreds on the production and performance teams, the immense ordeals they had to face to make this epic performance successful were seemingly immeasurable, given the many cultural limitations and technical challenges involved.
From inception to the actual public performance, it took a total of almost two years for this project to finally get on stage.
“Only the ones, who were completely committed to this project, stayed until the end and made it to the world premiere,” Atilah said with pride.
The cultural implications of the making of Matah Ati are interesting eye-openers for the regular Javanese cultural observer.Although the revered Raden Mas Said, also known as “The Slayer Prince”, has a following bordering on occultism, the director was steadfast in her goal to portray a mortal — albeit regal and dignified — image of his character as she believed represented reality then, without diminishing the awe and respect that her ancestor deserves.
For instance, tastefully pushing things to the limit, the performance of the female lead dancer in the scene where she was explored her body while imagining being with the prince of her dreams, depicted certain realities in the upbringing of female members of the royal family in the palace.
Atilah recounts in this context, that at the onset of menarche, “When I was 12 my grandmother called me and taught me everything about sex, making herbal elixirs and how to satisfy my future husband.”
“Your destiny as a woman requires you to be his courtesan in bed, an honorable wife otherwise, and his sister, mother, best friend and everything else when he needs you to be,” she added, remembering her grandmother’s words of wisdom on female sexuality.
Inspired by her colorful memories of palatial upbringing, this modern-day princess took it upon herself to go all out with this impressive production leaving no room for compromise when it came to details.
True to her passionate nature, she ventured far and wide conducting research on all possible information she could find on the subject.
This led to acquiring historical records from the Netherlands all the way to purchasing the Javanese antique costume and the jewelry collection of the late Indonesian fashion designer Iwan Tirta.
Interesting artifacts, including a personal journal of the legendary Raden Mas Said, came to light along with another diary written by one of the female fighters believed to have been a member of the 40-strong bow-and-pistol wielding women warriors led by his wife, Rubiyah, at that time.
All the research and materials aided Atilah in the writing of the script and lyrics of the songs used in the performance.
Considering the very limited literature on the subject matter, she relied on her creative mind and found inspiration from her characters by spending time at Rubiyah’s grave and also at the place where the gallant prince supposedly died in battle.
From there, she got ideas such as how the stage formations should appear based on the layout of the graves of the soldiers versus that of their leader.
While there, she also had musings and realizations about how, even in the 18th century, it was apparent that women played significant roles in society alongside their men and that despite the known feudal system in place, women were held in high esteem.
In the course of her research on the character of Raden Mas Said, Atilah
assumed that a heroic and gallant prince such as this to be successful must have had a strong woman behind him.
She considered her point proven right with the knowledge that Raden Mas Said always had the family matriarch behind him -- the queen mother, who was his grandmother Eyang Kusumonarso, and his warrior princess wife, Matah Ati.
The entire team of choreographers and classical dancers, all undergraduate and graduate performing arts students from Surakarta’s leading Indonesian Institute of Arts, were given additional education about their roots and what they mistakenly thought they’ve already been familiar with all this time.
Atilah started what she liked to refer to as her “dance laboratory” in Surakarta, where dancers, choreographers and court musicians alike worked long tedious hours with Jay, Astari, Atilah and the rest of their team blending the contemporary into the craft of classical Javanese dance and music, to form a harmonious mixture with the help of modern technology.
And, as Jay would have it, sacrificing the audience’s viewing pleasure is not an option considering the hard work and intricate details on display by way of 18th century costumes, jewelry and the many symbolic relics the stage was peppered with.
“I had to convince Atilah that the best way for the audience to experience the beauty and grandeur of this performance is to have it on an inclined stage,” Jay recalled, drawing a sketch of a stage angled at about 20 degrees for Atilah, who initially looked at it in dismay.
A lot of tears were shed — both of joy and pain — in the making of this considerably ambitious and colossal stage production by Indonesian standards.
But the significant success it gained and the pride it brought the country only inspired Atilah to move forward and aspire for yet other similar projects. Following the world premiere, invitations to grace the stage in countries such as India, Hong Kong and countries in Europe and the Americas are expected.
For the opera’s creator, the show’s success itself marked the happiest she has been in years.
“It’s been a journey of rediscovering my roots; one I’ve been alienated from for decades and I used to despise in my youth because it felt very limiting growing up in the palace.
“But now at my age, I have learned to appreciate and value my upbringing and it excites me that my youngest daughter is also so much into it,” Atilah said.
— Photos Courtesy of Davy Linggar
Dina Purita Antonio-Jufri, Contributor, Singapore | Sun, 11/14/2010 11:13 AM | Art and Design
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