ROYAL PUPPETEERS
YOGYAKARTA SHADOW PUPPET THEATRE MASTERS
An audience with the royal Dalang shadow puppeteer masters of Yogyakarta Kraton, the sultan’s palace complex located in the city of Yogyakarta, Central Java. Under normal circumstances only one master Dalang is present to manipulate the innumerable wayang kulit shadow puppet characters during a typical gamelan orchestra all-night performance. However, on this occaison by special arrangement, 14 of the kraton’s resident Dalang masters kindly took the time to air a selection of the palace puppets from Sri Sultan Hamengkubuwono X’s private wayang kulit collection.
