An awareness of the inequalities in the production and dissemination of knowledge between the Global North and the Global South forms the basis for the development of the discourse on decoloniality within both academic and artistic spheres. This new awareness that reality is not universal but rather pluriverse has prompted academics and art practitioners to re-examine everyday life to develop a sensitivity to the roots of power imbalances that may otherwise go unnoticed. The latest issue of Lembaran Antropologi vol. 4 no. 2 explores the theme “Anthropology and Decolonialisation in Performance Studies and Art Criticism” and features Rachmi Diyah Larasati from the Interdisciplinary Centre for the Study of Global Change, University of Minnesota, as editor, inviting readers to engage and gain a deeper understanding of how art and performance now reflect anthropological critique in artistic practice.
This edition discusses artistic practice not merely from an artistic perspective, but also in terms of efforts to convey concerns and social critique regarding everyday social phenomena. Issues concerning narratives of governance, expression, and living spaces form the core of the contributions in this edition. Moving beyond artistic practice based on established standards or conventions, attention is also drawn to the figures who determine these standards. Articles by Chaterji & Loravianti and Pangastuti re-examine the conventions or standards of artistic practice in the MTQ competition and the trans-cultural experiment of ‘Swan Lake’ using gamelan instruments. The presence of standards or conventions as criteria for artistic evaluation must be re-examined: which narratives or values predominantly influence artistic judgement?
Turning to the aspect of dance as a symbolic embodiment that takes root in the human body, rich in meaning and social messages. The article by Sekar Sari and Listyorini demonstrates that dance or choreography conveys messages and expressions to highlight issues regarding care work and forms of resistance against the narrative of global capitalism embedded in daily life. The final topic in this edition discusses the living spaces of folk arts such as Reog Ponorogo (Nurdiyanto, Amrullah, Mahadewa) and Horeg (Nursilah, Gietty, Setyani, Yoesoef). Both forms of folk art, which were originally performed in daily life through communal spaces, are now increasingly being featured in festivals, indicating the commodification of folk art as part of the tourism industry. Does this shift from communal activity to institutionalised practice create a space for negotiation between artists and audiences? To explore this discourse further, please access this edition via the following link: https://journal.ugm.ac.id/v3/LA/issue/view/916
[Okky Chandra Baskoro]
