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The journey of sainted Javanese prince Diponegoro

The capture: Two artists impersonating Diponegoro — in an Islamic garb — and a Dutch officer perform behind a scrim to the sounds of gamelan, in Opera Diponegoro, at Teater Salihara, Jakarta, last Friday and Saturday night

M. Taufiqurrahman (The Jakarta Post)
Jakarta
Thu, February 25, 2010

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The journey of sainted Javanese prince Diponegoro

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span class="inline inline-center">The capture: Two artists impersonating Diponegoro — in an Islamic garb — and a Dutch officer perform behind a scrim to the sounds of gamelan, in Opera Diponegoro, at Teater Salihara, Jakarta, last Friday and Saturday night. Courtesy of Salihara community/Witjak

When The Jakarta Post published a preview of Sardono W. Kusumo's Opera Diponegoro titled *Taking a Fresh Look at Diponegoro", an unsuspecting connoisseur of the respected choreographer's works could have expected an unconventional, if not controversial, account of the famed Javanese prince's life.

I, for one, expected that Sardono would bring down Diponegoro - whose name is synonymous with schools, universities, museums, hotels, streets and an army division in the country- from his celestial heights, from the realm of gods and heroes to his flesh-and-blood existence, complete with his ambivalence and ambiguities, the way historian Ann Kumar paints the portrait of the prince in her "Dipanegara (1787? - 1855)" published in April 1972 in the journal Indonesia.

It must have been profoundly unusual for someone in the early 19th century Java to don an Islamic garb, choose a life of asceticism and finally take up arms in a rebellion against the Dutch colonial government.

In her introductory account of Diponegoro, Kumar conjectures that it might have been the frustration springing from standing on the losing side of a power struggle that pitted Diponegoro against his next of kin.

An apparent heir to the throne, Diponegoro did not succeed his father Amangkubuwono III when the Yogyakarta king died in November 1814.

The deceased king was instead succeeded by his brother, the 13-year-old Mas Ambjah or Sultan Amangkubuwana IV, whose mother was a queen. Diponegoro's mother was of lower rank.

Diponegoro was promised by the Resident of Yogyakarta, John Crawfurd - or Djan Kerapet, as mentioned by him in his autobiography Babad Diponegoro - the throne if his brother died while still a minor or if the latter behaved improperly.

Amangkubuwana IV did die while still a minor in 1822, but was succeeded by his three-year-old son, under a Regency Council of which Diponegoro was a member.

Kumar wrote that three years later, Diponegoro broke completely with the Dutch government of Yogyakarta and the Java War began.

The five-year war, killing more than 200,000 Javanese and at least 8,000 Dutch soldiers, drained much of the colonial government's resources, almost causing the collapse of the Dutch colonial enterprise in the country.

Diponegoro has consequently been lionized in the country's historiography as a heroic leader who stood against the colonial occupation.

Sardono is no revisionist and his take on Diponegoro does not stray too far from the conventional wisdom of celebrating Diponegoro's devotion to his land and people, this time enriched with the prince's spiritual journey deep within Javanese-tinged Islamic spirituality.

And this time, for the sake of technicality, Sardono had to trim down his opera to a little over an hour and reduce the number of dancers to five from 40, the number of dancers employed when it was performed last year in the hall of the Asian Society in New York.

He also used a scrim, a theater drop appearing opaque when a scene in front is lighted and transparent or translucent when a scene in back is lighted, to highlight his mission statement.

The scrim, separating the stage from the audience, consisted of an oversized painting depicting the capture of Diponegoro, by Raden Saleh Syarif Bustaman.

In the famed work of art, Raden Saleh, an early sympathizer of Diponegoro, paints a defiant Diponegoro in the face of his captor General Hendrik Merkus de Kock. Raden Saleh even took the trouble of putting his own face on one of Diponegoro's followers as a token of his support for Diponegoro's cause.

Raden Saleh's version of Diponegoro's capture is in stark contrast to another renowned impression of the event, drawn by Dutch painter Nicolaas Pienemann.

In Pienemann's painting, Diponegoro looks submissive, backing away from de Kock who points the subdued prince to the waiting couch. In Pieneman's version, Pangeran Diponegoro is placed a step lower than de Kock whereas Raden Saleh depicts the Javanese as on the same level.

Throughout the performance, Raden Saleh's painting loomed large over dancers and actors on the stage, casting a pall of dramatic effect to the one-hour-plus performance.

That's the story. What about the performance?

Even without the dramatic backdrop, Sardono's Opera Diponegoro is a dolorous affair and took on a somewhat mythical quality.

The opera's brief opening scene could be viewed as an onslaught of Dutch colonialism.

Over a chilling classical tune, a Dutch soldier is seen onstage holding the reins of a middle-aged skinny Javanese man, who frequently struck a Jesus Christ pose as he was being whipped by the said soldier.

The choice of a classical tune was apparently deliberate as it was used only to soundtrack the scenes of oppression toward the indigenous people. For the remaining duration of the show, it was Javanese gamelan music, composed by Waluyo Sastro Sukarno, which set a majestic tone to the show.

Sardono had to be very brief with this opening scene, as his opera only focused on the spiritual journey of the prince and the spiritual awakening that motivated him to lead his people to fight against the Dutch and culminated with his capture.

Some of signature scenes of the show come midway through the one-hour-plus performance and this included Diponegoro in the deep throes of his spiritual journey meeting, among others, Ratu Kidul or the Queen of the South Sea, a famous mythical figure in Javanese culture, and some of Apostles including Sunan Kali Jaga, one of the founding fathers of Mataram.

Preceding these scenes was the part where Diponegoro was conversing with his wife in her bedroom, which was no less chilling.

It was during this scene that the skills - and the physical endurance - of Sardono's dancers were put to the test.

Dancer Hanny Herlina, who played Princess Retnaningsih, Diponegoro's wife, gave a new meaning to the words balancing act when she sung lines from the History of Dipanegara in the land of Ngayogyakarta Adiningrat - from which the opera was based - in dhandhanggula meter, while performing slow-burning movements from Javanese traditional dance on the back of dancer Mugiyono Kasido, who played Diponegoro.

Skeptics may perceive Diponegoro's struggle as nothing but political, but for the choreographer it was more of a messianic duty.

In his conversation with one of the apostles, sung in dhandanggula meter, the King, speaking through the apostles, said that Diponegoro could not reject the task of being the commander of the Javanese in their fight against the Dutch as:

"It is already preordained as the intent of all Javanese people, as deemed by God Almighty, that you be the chosen one," the King says.

These lines alone raised Diponegoro back to his celestial heights, and Sardono's opera was a celebration in his pantheon.

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