Indonesian theater group wins jury award at Seoul festival

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Jakarta (ANTARA) – Indonesian theater group Lab Teater Ciputat (LTC) has won a Special Jury Award at the 2026 Playing Art and Doing Art Festival (PADAF) in Seoul, South Korea, for its production “Malin Kundang Lirih.”

“Participation in PADAF serves as a prototype for LTC’s incubator program, which acts as a nursery for talent,” producer Wulan Pusposari said in a press release issued in Jakarta on Sunday.

“BUDAmFEST serves as a platform for representation, while our collaboration with PADAF facilitates the distribution of the work,” she added.

LTC presented the production, based on a West Sumatran folktale, at Theater M in Seoul’s Gangnam District on Oct. 31, 2026.

The group staged a second performance on Nov. 3 in collaboration with the Seoul Factory for the Performing Arts.

Pusposari said Hyoung-taek Lim, director of the Seoul Factory for the Performing Arts and PADAF 2026 co-artistic director, had recommended the production for the festival.

Lim extended the invitation after watching the performance at LTC’s Buka Dapur Mini Festival (BUDAmFEST) at Jakarta’s Museum of National Awakening in 2025, she said.

Pusposari said Lim’s appreciation had created opportunities for broader artistic exchanges between Indonesian and South Korean artists, including potential workshops and collaborative projects.

She added that Lim co-directed the Nov. 3 performance, which featured South Korean actor Choi Min-hyeok as a dancer, guitarist Yoon Kyungro and pansori singer Yu Juhyoun.

“Malin Kundang Lirih” explores experiences rooted in the Minangkabau tradition of merantau, or leaving one’s homeland, addressing pride, failure, shame and longing for one’s mother and home.

The 16th PADAF ran from Oct. 31 to Nov. 1, 2026, in Seoul. The annual festival has been held since 2010.

PADAF provides an international platform for artists to explore interdisciplinary forms of artistic expression beyond conventional genre boundaries.