Some artists are trying to make Indonesian-style comics a thing

Enough of those Japanese and American comics that dominate the comic scene. Rising Indonesian stars are pushing to get their work out there in their own “Indonesian” style. 

Art supplies manufacturing giant Faber-Castell will hold a comic strip contest in Bali this month to paint the way for young Indonesian comic artists, according to Berita Bali. 

Plagiarism’s a pretty common practice here, you know what we mean with all the copying/pasting and Wikipedia attributions going on from academia to local government officials. But, here’s a competition that’s challenging artists to develop their own style.

“Cuma di Indonesia,” meaning “Only in Indonesia,” is the theme of the competition. The work needs to be original with no plagiarism and of course since it’s Indonesia, no pornography allowed. 

Other than Bali, the competition will be holed in 10 other Indonesian cities: Jakarta, Bandung, Yogyakarta, Semarang, Surabaya, Medan, Samrinda, Makassar, Pekanbaru and Palembang. 

Not surprisingly, the winning work will be published in a comic books. 

The competition on October 19 will be at the Indonesian Arts Institute (ISI) Denpasar.