Shadow Puppet Festival Canceled Due to Excessively Sunny Weather

The 12th Annual International Shadow Puppet Festival in Bali has been canceled for the first time in its history after three consecutive days of unbroken sunshine made it impossible for audiences to see any of the performances. 'Shadow puppetry requires contrast,' explained festival director Wayan Kelir, standing in front of a cotton screen onto which approximately $40,000 worth of intricately articulated leather puppets were casting absolutely no visible shadows. 'We need darkness on one side and light on the other. What we have is light on both sides. The puppets are there. The audience cannot see them. It's like performing in an oven.' The festival, traditionally held during the rainy season, was rescheduled this year to accommodate a visiting Indonesian delegation. Organizers gambled on overcast conditions based on historical weather data showing an 87 percent chance of cloud cover during the festival week. 'The 13 percent got us,' Wayan said. Performers from twelve countries attempted various workarounds, including performing under umbrellas, inside tents, and in a shipping container that one Indonesian dalang described as 'acoustically spectacular but spiritually wrong.' Master puppeteer Ketut Wayang, who traveled from Java with a complete set of hand-tooled buffalo hide wayang kulit figures for a sold-out midnight performance of the Ramayana, was particularly affected. 'I have spent forty years perfecting the art of manipulating light and shadow,' he said. 'Today I was defeated by a clear sky. The gods are laughing.' Organizers have announced the festival will return to its original rainy-season dates. 'We will never again bet against the weather,' Wayan said. 'A shadow puppeteer who ignores the darkness is like a fish that ignores the water.'