Melbourne Soreng (2021)

 

Lose yourself in this stunning collaboration between Victorian College of the Arts and ISI Yogyakarta dance students, dedicated to Festival Lima Gunung.

 

Sutanto Mendut is a renowned musician, artist, philosopher, lecturer, journalist, cultural leader and instigator of Festival Lima Gunung (Five Mountains Festival), a community-based, fiercely independent festival from the mountain areas north of Yogyakarta, Indonesia. In previous years, the Lima Gunung Festival have welcomed Victorian College of the Arts Social Practice students and their peers from Indonesian Institute of the Arts (ISI) to participate in the festival. Pak Sutanto visited the VCA in March 2020 to workshop the concept of a “Melbourne Soreng”, the Soreng being a mode of traditional Javanese dance, with the view that VCA Dance students could return a performance to the festival. The onset of COVID-19 meant that the Global Atelier exchange had to find another form. Led by choreographer and VCA Dance Lecturer Linda Sastradipradja, and in collaboration with the dance department at ISI, Interactive Composition PhD researcher Patrick Hartono constructed a virtual world for the dancers to collaborate and bring the Melbourne Soreng to life.