UNS — The creative process in musical arts creation is inseparable from cultural issues. Dr. Akhmad Ramdhon, a lecturer in the Sociology Study Program at the Faculty of Social and Political Sciences (FISIP), Universitas Sebelas Maret (UNS) Surakarta, explores art in the urban social sphere. He delivered this insight in the Association of Indonesian Art Educators (APSI) National Webinar for the Greater Solo Region, Thursday (23/12/2021).
In 2015-2016, the intangible heritage distribution mapping in Surakarta conducted by Dr. Ramdhon pointed out that this city has a very broad artistic space and context. The map certainly validates the idea that Surakarta is a city of culture. “Considering the concern on Solo as a city of culture, the distribution map is presented as the existence of the daily practice. Apart from any factor, network, institution, education, and so on,” said Dr. Ramdhon.
The recent achievement, in which gamelan was designated by UNESCO as a world cultural heritage, also validates Surakarta as one of the regions with an integral part on this framework. This success is inseparable from the national regulations in Law no. 5 of 2017 concerning the Advancement of Culture. In Surakarta there is also a Regional Regulation (Perda) No. 4 of 2018 concerning the Promotion of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
In front of more than 100 participants in the webinar, Dr. Ramdhon mentions that there is an important role for artists in it. “The two landscapes cannot be separated from your contributions. Artists in Solo, the maestro, art activists who cannot be separated (from the fact that) they encourage the existence of the law,” he said.
According to Dr. Ramdhon, the landscape of Surakarta as a city of culture was once reinterpreted. When it comes to the acts of musicality, the collective memory of the townspeople can be seen easily, such as the existence of Lokananta, Solo International Ethnic Music (SIEM) Festival, International Gamelan Festival (IGF), Solo Keroncong Festival, Bukan Musik Biasa (BMB), Rock in Solo, as well as Gong Magazine. This fact shows that the concern toward art in the context of music has a large space. For Dr. Ramdhon personally, this cannot be separated from the existence of groups or communities in Soloraya.
Dr. Ramdhon connects the previous context with the available educational institution spaces. A city becomes a source of learning for teachers/lecturers to develop knowledge, assessment, and preservation, which leads to development. A city can also be a learning space for students to develop knowledge, research, preservation as learning materials, and resources.
Indeed, these spaces cannot be separated from the epistemic works that lie beneath them. The creative process and the process of creation are the other two aspects discussed by Dr. Ramdhon. A creative process involves two-way collaborative action between cities and educational institutions where the creative process encourages creation that is more inclusive both in terms of approach and platform.
Dr. Ramdhon concluded his presentation by stressing the challenges of how collaborative and collective work in the creation process can be in line with documentation, literacy archiving, and the initiation of discussion spaces in the context of art politics. Humas UNS
Reporter: Rangga Pangestu Adji
Editor: Dwi Hastuti