Magical and poetic stories conjure a distant, dreamlike place [Video]

Intimate storytelling forms the heart of Jumaadi’s practice, revealed through narrative paintings, performance and poetry. The tales draw from villages and communities in Indonesia, with enchanting characters that are both imagined and borrowed from Javanese puppetry imagery. As the stories surface on large cloths, tin-sheet cut-outs and buffalo-hide puppets — as well as in shadowpuppet productions — Jumaadi recounts folktales, stories of migration and fantastical journeys.

In 2000 Jumaadi moved from Java to Sydney to study, establishing a prolific career as an artist in Australia while continuing to develop Indonesian storytelling styles, such as wayang kulit(shadowpuppet theatre). He now divides his time between Australia and a studio on the hillside of the small village of Imogiri, in the region of Yogyakarta, Central Java. The area carries historical significance as the former complex of the royal graveyard for the sultans of Central Java, and it is where his stories and collaborations with …