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A Dream Come True: Shooting EKI Dance Company
Edward Suhadi comment 0 Comments

I have been a long time fan of EKI (Eksotika Karmawibhangga Indonesia) Dance Company since I saw their show back in the 2004. I remember that was the first time in my adult life where I sat and watched this live performance of drama, dance and humour no more than 10 metres in front of me. These people, these performers are basically breathing the same air that I breathe, and there’s no edit, no plugin, no retakes. I can hear them scream, laugh, and even breathe between the dance moves. I can hear the sound of their bare feet landed on the floor. I fall in love.

Since then I have been following them closely, and I try to attend their every performance. Everytime they never failed to bring joy to my heart.

It’s always been a dream to shoot them. I imagined that what it would be like to spend a couple of days with them. An empty spacious rooms with just them bare chested with lights, lots of lights, and we shoot our brains and hearts out.

It’s been only a dream. I’ve contacted them a couple of times, and they have responded very positively, but alas, it was still not meant to be. We’re both very busy and just keep this appointment of meeting and actually doing projects together.

Up until late this March. I was attending their latest show “Kabaret Oriental: Anak Juragan Batik”. As always, they entertained and touched the crowd. We laughed and at the same time amazed at the dances.

Coming out from the theatre my dad approached me and suddenly introduced me to this guy, Alim, who apparently is a producer of the show. Talks become laughs, and as it happens, when I said they I have been wanting to shoot them for such a long time, he responded like crazy. “We are more than delighted to do that. We’ve been desperately searching for a photographer to shoot us!”

Eh?

Dreams do come true. If you believe long and hard, and when you are ready, and you know how to react when they approach you, they do come true. Coming back from this Ambon trip, I’ll start to meet up with them to get to know each other better, and hopefully, will start a long and prosperous relationship with them.

Bonus: Coming back from the show, late at night, I got a text from Alim: “Would you like to shoot the show and the backstage for tommorrow’s show?” Trying to sound cool and calm, “Well, if that’s what you want…” KIDDING! Of course I leaped at the offer and screamed, “YESSS!!!”

Below is the gallery from that show. I focused on the backstage, since those are the gems, the story ridden photographs.

Complete gallery of the shoot is on my edwardsuhadi.me portfolio website.

Dreams do come true. Believe. Get sweaty.