Comedy to rule in Jakarta video festival

Art space ruangrupa will hold a set of video screenings this month to May in the lead of the 4th Jakarta International Video Festival in July, with comedy as their big theme.

The video screening dubbed "Komedi Putar" - a pun from Indonesian phrase for merry-go-round - will screen 16 videos in campuses, art and public space in several cities in Indonesia.

Event manager Nadia said Tuesday that Komedi Putar has been carried out in University of Indonesia (UI) and Pelita Harapan University (UPH).

"We're planning to hold it in Bina Nusantara University and Atmajaya University".

Ruangrupa said the videos with comedy themes that will be screened, including Apple on A Tree (2006) from Germany, Video Hacking (1999) from Spain, and Play with Beauty (2007) from Indonesia.

Ruangrupa said Komedi Putar was a warm up in the lead of the video festival, better known as OK. Video.

The festival this year will be held at the National Gallery. It will look at comedy as a form of communication using the medium of video, which responds to a variety of problems in critical ways.

They are opening up a call for video submission from around the world.

Nadia said that organizers expect at least more submissions and festival viewers than the last festival.

The last festival in 2007, attracted 350 video submissions and 27 participating countries.

Exhibition viewers rose from 3000 viewers in the 2005 to 5000 in 2007.