Sita sits cross-legged wearing royal Javanese dress in Ramayana dance at Yogyakarta
About this photograph
- Creator
- Margery H. Freeman
- Date created
- Unknown
- Location
- Yogyakarta, Indonesia
- License
- This photograph copyright ©2006. Terms of use
Related media
Learn more
- Search LEARN NC for costumes, dance, Indonesia, Java, performance, Ramayana, royal clothing, Sita, theater, and Yogyakarta.
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Sita sits cross-legged wearing royal Javanese dress in a Ramayana dance performed at Yogyakarta in July 1986. Her eyes gaze forward and her hands rest overlapping on her lap. Her bare toes are flexed. To the Javanese this pose is intended to suggest calm refinement and female perfection combined with energetic alertness.
Like the male dancer who plays Rama, the young woman who plays Sita wears a tall Javanese-style golden crown and a royal Yogyakarta pattern batik cloth wrapped over her red print leggings. Long black hair hangs loose down her back. She also wears a small ritual sword at her waist indicating her royal warrior social status.
