In other words, while retaining our private experiences, we can attempt to incarnate myth, putting on its ill-fitting skin to perceive the relativity of our problems, their connection to the “roots” and the relativity of the “roots” in the light of today’s experience. If the situation is brutal, if we strip ourselves and touch an extraordinarily intimate layer, exposing it, the life mask cracks and falls away.

Towards a Poor Theatre

(An aunt once told me I had a lucky face…)

Jokes aside, I do feel honoured and lucky to have gotten a grant for my DYCP. I say lucky because I know for a fact that there are many artists out there with stronger ambitions and better plans, arguably more deserving of this gift than me but for whatever reason the Black Hole™ has decided to send me back some money from the Arts Council. I believe in always respecting the chaos and arbitrariness that rules our lives (especially when it comes to public funds…)

Aside from the part where I promised the Ministry of Magic Arts Council England that I would blog about my project…

I want to find a way to share my work to anyone who is interested to read. I have always loved seeing the stats of my website, seeing different parts of the world light up with friends who have for whatever reason decided to grace my blog at 3 a.m. (Hello!)

The project I’m embarking on is a search for myths—the ones that exist in our culture, our families, ourselves. How do we find them and how do we tell them? I am curious about how I can share the alien world I grew up in (Jakarta in the 1990s…)/stories of the “other” we fear so much, in such a way that will make you see your own stories. I want to invite you deep inside your own story and self, and I will go deep into mine, and we will meet in the imaginary room that exists underneath the everyday.

I am curious about the universal truths that exist in our world—of which there are very few. Many things that are important to us—like power, philosophy and even human rights—are simply constructs and agreements. Here are some universal truths:

1) we all die, 2) we all have a mother and a father (even if you may not know them or like them) and arguably 3) that we all fall in love.

^not exhaustive

Universal truths are the bedrock on which we create and tell myths.

I am pulled by two poles in my research—on one hand that our bodies and our selves are the ways in which we sense the world, and that a deep knowledge and reflection as a person/artist is necessary for this work. On the other hand, that the artist needs to consciously ask—who do I need to become in order to find the freedom to tell this story? What mask do I have to create in order that I can reveal myself (paradoxically by losing it)?

So the next few months will be filled with writing, experimenting, creating work with companions like the inimitable (the word I default to when someone’s brilliance transcends my command of English) Eelyn Lee (with an exciting project for Encounter Bow, hint: 福禄寿!), Created a Monster for a premiere of Unforgettable Girl this fall, Flabbergast Theatre, Matej Matejka, and Kristine Landon-Smith, among others.

And please, I am always happy to receive random hellos, questions, thoughts, feedback, insults and all manners of shade in my inbox – about my practice or just about me personally. But please don’t be a stranger. If you want, do subscribe to my mailing list. I have nothing to spam you with (I wish I had something to sell) other than these kinds of posts, if they interest you!

More anon.