A visit to a gong-making factory in central Java.
I shot most of these with natural light, so the color of the metal is visible. It starts with placing a slab of bronze in an open kiln, and heating it to white-hot.
Then several guys with various hammers gather round it and hammer it into shape. Things look blurry because I am shooting with natural light, and a slow shutter speed.
You can see one guy holding a plywood shield over the area that wants to flame up.
They have no safety aquipment of any kind, not even shoes or face-masks or gloves.
After a few minutes the bronze gets too cool to shape, so it is placed back in the flames again.
These guys come from small villages around Java, where there is no work. They come here in the hopes of getting enough money to send home to their families.
In the foreground you can see slender metal shafts which are used to hammer out the central nipple of a large gong.
they move carefully and quietly, and without argument or fuss, all of them focussed on the job
The men stand as close as possible and take turns hitting, bang, bang, bang, bang, to get as many hits in before the metal cools.
The larger hammers are basically sections of logs.
The guy in the red shirt is holding the gong in place with two metal tongs.
This shot I used a flash, so you can see the various tools.
See their bare feet, resting on a piece of newly cut log, still wet with sap, to give their feet some purchase, and some coolness.
After the shaping, comes smoothing and polishing.
Going over the whole surface with a file, to get it smooth and shiny.
A finished gong, getting fine-tuning.
This guy asked me to take his picture. He didn't ask me to send him one, he just wanted to know that somebody noticed him. He was proud of his work.
Tap tap, by himself, in the courtyard of the house of the rich guy who owns the gong factory.
A bunch of finished gongs ready for the customer.
