By Alex Low
Light and shadows, wayang kulit is enjoying a renaissance.
Shadows are fascinating, aren’t they? More than just the absence of light, they carry layers of meaning—a hidden side, a reflection, a secret self. In Jungian terms, the “shadow” represents the parts of ourselves we keep in darkness but can’t escape. It’s fitting, then, that wayang kulit, the traditional Malaysian shadow play, tells stories that explore those hidden depths.
I was at the cinema when the screen flickered to life with the silhouettes of a recent performance—the figures alive with the ritual rhythm of Southeast Asian storytelling. But instead of mythological heroes or noble warriors, a very different shape emerged: Venom. The Marvel antihero, all fangs and sinew, moved across the screen in leather and gold leaf.
The short played just before Venom: The Last Dance, providing a surreal and surprising prologue to a Hollywood blockbuster. Yet it didn’t feel ham-fisted. It felt right, like two storytelling mediums working in tandem.
THE PUPPET MASTER
Tintoy Chua.
Behind the figures was Tintoy Chuo, a Malaysian designer and visual artist who builds puppets for wayang kulit. He’s not the dalang (storyteller) but he gives the characters their form, posture, and symbolic weight. The shadows we see begin with his hands.
Together with his collaborator Take Huat, he formed Fusion Wayang Kulit (Fusion WK), an award-winning team recognised by global brands like Lucasfilm, Marvel, and PlayStation. At his gallery in GMBB, Chuo takes me on a tour of the space, sharing insights into the craft in a calm, reflective setting.
Unfamiliar with the art form, I found myself pausing at the intricate silhouettes mounted on the walls. Pop culture icons such as Darth Vader, Batman, and Iron Man were rendered with the same care as their traditional counterparts. There was no hierarchy, only a shared reverence.
TAKING SACRED FORM
Stories like Star Wars are retold in traditional form.
Chuo’s journey began publicly in 2012 with an exhibition featuring Star Wars puppets. Darth Vader and Luke Skywalker were reimagined in the gilded, filigreed style of wayang kulit. “No one had done it before,” Chuo explains. “We didn’t know where to start, so we bought a book on the artform to learn the style’s blueprint.”
Unable to find a master puppeteer online, the duo showcased just the two puppets. After the exhibition, a master puppeteer named Pak Dain found them and everything changed. Chuo had always wanted to see a dalang tell a futuristic story through wayang kulit. “I wanted to see Star Wars performed in that style. Old meets new.”
“We were lucky that our first Star Wars puppets were based on a story already about light and dark. It fits naturally with wayang kulit, which — like Malaysia’s first animator Hasan Muthalib once said — is one of the earliest forms of animation.” — TINTOY CHUO
They spent ten months working with Pak Dain before debuting the full performance in 2013. “There are two ways to do this,” Chuo says. “One is fast: you have a cool idea and don’t care what people think. The other way, which we took, was harder. You follow the principles. Everything I designed went through Pak Dain. He had to approve it before we moved forward. It took longer but it was better.”
That approach proved wise. A university professor who’d seen their early work initially criticised it as gimmicky—just sci-fi puppets with no understanding of tradition. But rather than dismissing the feedback, Chuo leaned into it. The professor and Pak Dain later held conversations debating the project’s merit. “In the end, they agreed what we were doing wasn’t wrong,” he says. “That’s why doing it the proper way is important, because we’re not just collaborating, we’re honouring the art form.”
MODERN ARCHETYPES, FAMILIAR STRUGGLES
Fusion Wayang Kulit is bringing shadow puppetry to new audiences.
“The difficult part is translating modern characters into this traditional form,” Chuo explains. “I already know and love these characters—Star Wars, Marvel, DC. But then I ask: if someone were to conceptualise Batman 500 years ago, how would they draw him? They didn’t have cars or even screws, so I imagine what he’d look like in that time.”
The result doesn’t feel like parody. It feels mythic. “We were lucky that our first Star Wars puppets were based on a story already about light and dark,” Chuo recalls. “It fits naturally with wayang kulit, which—like Malaysia’s first animator Hasan Muthalib once said—is one of the earliest forms of animation.”
Fusion WK has since created nearly 250 fusion characters. But their approach isn’t formulaic. “If the story has clear heroes and villains, I design them that way. But sometimes it’s more of a dark-versus-dark situation. Then I go back to who that character is in the original.”
Spending more time with Chuo’s work, I noticed how closely modern heroes echo ancient archetypes. Characters like Bima or Batman both wrestle with power, vengeance, and morality. These stories may look new, but they’re old myths dressed in contemporary aesthetics.
It made sense, then, that Chuo’s favourite traditional tale is Hikayat Maharaja Wana, a Malaysian adaptation of the Ramayana. As a boy, he was drawn to Hanuman, who was depicted as strong, loyal, and unstoppable. But another figure lingered: Wana, or Ravana, a character that was feared, admired, and misunderstood. His presence echoed something deeper: that the shadow isn’t just out there. It’s within us.
TRADITION IN FLUX
The Venom character presented in wayang kulit form.
Despite his success, Chuo knows wayang kulit is under threat. Like many traditional arts, it’s fading—not for lack of beauty or meaning, but because it takes time. “The stories take longer to make,” he admits. “Younger generations don’t always find them attractive. They see it as old-fashioned, and old-fashioned means you throw it away to keep moving.”
To counter that, Chuo runs monthly workshops out of his gallery. These hands-on sessions invite participants to make their own puppets from start to finish. While full-scale performance puppets are over 20 inches tall, participants work with display-friendly versions around 12 to 14 inches.
Participants purchase a blank puppet, cut and colour it, attach the wooden sticks, and bring it to life. More than just an introduction, the workshop offers a way to engage directly with tradition and to shape it with their own hands. And in doing so, perhaps they’ll catch a glimpse of their own shadow reflected in it, which will help keep the art form alive for the future.
(Photos: Fusion Wayang Kulit)
