Anja Dornieden and Juan David González Monroy
The Masked Monkeys (2015)
16mm, black and white, sound, 30 minutes

Evening Screening
21 October 2016, 7 – 9pm
(film begins at 7:30pm)

Followed by a conversation between the artists and Kunstverein München Film Curator Vincent Stroep.

Daytime Screenings
22 October until 11 November 2016
Screening at 11am, 11:30am, 12pm, 12:30pm, 1pm, 1:30pm, 2pm, 2:30pm, 3pm, 3:30pm, 4pm, 4:30pm, 5pm, 5:30pm

It’s a tale of training, transformation, and transcendence – a lesson in mystical mastery by masked macaque monkeys. Anja Dornieden and Juan David González Monroy’s 30-minute 16mm film, The Masked Monkeys (2015), documents the controversial Javanese street art and theatrical ritual of Wayang Topeng Monyet (shadow/puppet+mask+monkey).

Trained monkeys perform a series of tasks rooted in social allegory and religious significance. Some celebrate the practice as a form of folk-art derived from Indonesian mythology and thousands of years of masked and performative arts. Others find it a cruel instance of animal torture and exploitation used by the impoverished to survive. Dornieden and González Monroy neither condemn nor condone the practice, but focus instead on the larger social context from which this practice arises – peering into the traditions, training methods, motivations, and distinct roles performed.

The interrelationship between the travelling master, the monkey, and the codes by which they both must adhere is key. Much of the narration is borrowed and adapted from Thomas E. Hill’s Manual of Social and Business Forms, a 19th century guide on proper etiquette, business strategies, and class relations. Through this juxtaposition, the filmmakers emphasize the training and performance of both human and primate behavior as a process of imitation, repetition, and embodiment.

Accompanied by percussive gamelan music throughout, the film documents the often brutal ways in which the monkeys are taught, the handler’s preparation, the performative ritual itself, and the spiritual and social subtexts. A fusion of class analysis and spiritual mediumship, the clothed monkey first enacts a series of amusing and theatrical gestures as a nobleman, then as a man of distinction trying to pass himself off as being of a lower class, before performing physical feats of physical and mental prowess. Finally, after a short moment of leisure, the monkey is adorned with its idiosyncratic mask. Wearing a doll-head, the monkey enters a trance and transforms into an open vessel for the spirits of the dead and the world of dreams. By depicting the complex routines of the performers and the trainers, the filmmakers provoke conflicting emotions in the viewer that resist reducing the practice to oddity, amusement, or exploitation, while also critically addressing the paths taken for mastery and success.

CREDITS

Producer
Juan David González Monroy, Anja Dornieden

Screen play / Camera / Editors / Production design
Anja Dornieden, Juan David González Monroy

Sound design
Anja Dornieden, Juan David González Monroy, Christian Obermaier

Production assistant
Rendy Herdiyan

Additional assistance – Ceribon
Maman Sugiman

Translation
Leonhard Bartolomeus

Voice-over
Miranda Roszkowski

Voice-over recording
Lewis Lloyd

Foley artist
Martin Landenbach

Sound post-production
Christian Obermaier

Negative cutter
Monika Dörge

Film lab services
Interstudio, Niagara Custom Lab, Andec Filmtechnik

Special thanks
Budi & Dapin, Cassidi, Sarinah & Firman, Hendri, Hari, Bro & Win, Sumad

Additional thanks
Reza Afisina, Indra Ameng, Marwan Andan, Jutta Brendemühl, Sylvain Chaussée, Ade Darmawan, Faizal Kamaluddin, Chris Kennedy, Andrew Kim, LaborBerlin, Rizki Lazuardi, Katrin Sohns, Feriansyah Thajib, Uli Ziemons

AD
JDGM

© OJOBOCA

1-5: film stills from Anja Dornieden and Juan David González Monroy, The Masked Monkeys (2015). Courtesy of the artists.