The Asmat Cultural Festival 2011 : Papua

TweetThe Asmat region of Eastern Papua is a further festival hotspot, with one of the biggest and more notable seasonal things to do being the Asmat Art and Culture Festival. This event is staged in early October and see the region's acclaimed woodcarving showcased at its very best. You will also likely find some displays of traditional dancing.

The cultural expressions of Papua’s renowned Asmat Tribe will be the highlight of Indonesia's most eastern island as the Asmat Cultural Festival is scheduled to take place at the Yos Sudarso Field, Asmat District on 20 to 25 October 2011. This year marks the 26th edition of the Asmat Cultural Festival since it was first introduced in 1981. In its previous edition, the Asmat Cultural Festival managed to attract international tourists from Australia, Germany, Japan, and Korea.

The main feature of the festival is obviously the signature wood carving art of the Asmat. The Asmat are known to have the capability of carving wood into fascinating artworks directly without drawing any sketches first. To the Asmat, their woodcarvings are inextricably linked with the spirit world, and therefore, are not principally considered as aesthetic objects. Much of the highly original art of the Asmat is symbolic of warfare, headhunting, and warrior-ancestor veneration. For centuries the Asmat, preoccupied with the necessity of appeasing ancestral spirits, produced a wealth of superbly designed shields, canoes, sculptured figures, and drums. In terms of the model, Asmat carving is very diverse, ranging from human statues, boats, panels, shields, drums, kaswari egg up the pole. Asmat usually adopt the experience and the everyday environment as their carving patterns, such as trees, boats, animals, people who are boating, people who are hunting, and many more. Carving is a living tradition and a ritual that is closely associated with the spirituality of life and respect for ancestors. When the Asmat carve, they do not just make pattern on wood, but they also flow a spirituality of life.

The most special and unique is that every work of sculpture does not have the same or a duplicate because they do not produce the same pattern carved on a large scale. So, if we have one of Asmat carvings with a certain pattern, it is the only one that exists because of Asmat people do not make the same pattern in carving. The form can be the same, such as shields or panels, but about a pattern would be different. That is the uniqueness of Asmat carvings.

To achieve the Asmat, the tourists have to stop in Timika. Followed by plane pioneers headed Ewer District and takes about 45 minutes. From Ewer continued for 20 minute speedboat ride to Agats.

Tourism potential that can be enjoyed in the district of Asmat, among others ,festival & travel mart in the Raja Ampat Islands are also held in conjunction with festival Asmat tribal art. Or you can held around to the Museum of Culture and Progress are located 2 km from the city center, boat and dance that is usually performed to welcome important guests and dignitaries, longhouse in Agats about 500 meters from the center of town, call the spirits dance, and the Lorentz National Park in District Sawa Erma and Agats.