YOGYAKARTA – A total of 230 dancers and 30 musicians of the Ramayana Prambanan Ballet performing the Api Suci (Sacred Flame) episode has been awarded by the Guiness World Record as the Ramayana performance that involved most dancers as well as the longest running and routine ballet performing from 1961 to 2012.
Certificate presentation was handed over by a representative from Guinness World Records, Lucia Sini Gagliesi, to President Director of PT. TWC Borobudur Prambanan and Ratu Boko, Purnomo Siswoprasetjo, in the closing ceremony of a national Ramayana festival on Monday evening (15/10).
The Director of Api Suci as well as mentor in the Ramayana Prambanan Ballet, Prof. Dr. Timbul Haryono, said that the award from Guiness was the drive to encourage him and the artists to maintain quality and existence of the ballet. “This become the boost to increase quality and existence of the Ramayana ballet. I hope this would encourage the young generation to be more appreciative of their own culture,” said the lecturer in Faculty of Cultural Sciences.
The Director of Performance Arts Study Programme in the UGM Graduate School added that the preparations for the Api Suci episode was done in two months, involving dancers and people from the surrounding areas. “It happened that the Api Suci is the last episode of the Ramayana. I also thought that I could involve up to 230 dancers on one stage,” said Timbul who had become a Ramayana dancer since passing junior highschool back in 1961.
The Api Suci episode is performed for 25 minutes by 230 children, adolescent and adult dancers. The story says that Rama were reunited with Dewi Sinta, but Rama doubted his wife’s faithfullness. To prove this, she was burned in the fire. Fortunately, Dewi Sinta was not burned and saved by the Fire Gods, thus proving her faithfullness.