Jepara Wood Carving In Industry 4.0 Era

Bambang Kartono

, Widyastuti

ITK Binus Malang, Indonesia

Universitas Negeri Makasar, Indonesia

Keywords: Industry 4.0, wood carving, creative actors.

Abstract: Industrial development has now entered in a new era known as the Industry 4.0. This change certainly affects

culture in global and local communities. One of them is the Jepara wood carving industry, where the interest

of young carving artists towards Jepara wood carving art seems to be diminishing. This study wanted to find

out how far the industrial revolution 4.0 had an influence on woodcarving industry players in Jepara so that

effective solutions could be obtained to develop wood carving creations from the younger generation. The

purpose of this study is to document and analyze the behavior of wood carving actors who have made use of

technological advancements and automation as an effort to transform technology to improve the creation of

quality carving works, both in terms of product distribution and aspects of production efficiency. This research

critically contains the influence of Industry 4.0 trends on woodcarving industry players and how the attitudes

and readiness of Jepara wood carving artists face the industrial era 4.0. The challenge of changing the Industry

4.0 towards wood carving creative actors is expected to be the answer and have an impact on the distribution

chain of wood carving products and the quality of wood carving. In this study the methodology used was:

literature study, field observations, interviews with Jepara carvings and Jepara carving documentation. The

results of the study show that there are wood carving artists who use digital media to market wood carving in

Jepara. In addition, this study also found two things that are quite important, how artists carve take a positive

position in accepting the presence of renewable technology, so that carving actors also change in accordance

with technological changes and developments in industry progress, and how the handwork skills that have

been owned generation can be combined with the progress of automation

1 INTRODUCTION

Industrial development has now entered a new era

known as the Industry 4.0. This era has an effect on

cultural change in global and local communities.

According to Minister of Industry Erlangga Hartarto

in his remarks to Making Indonesia 4.0 (2018), the

phenomenon of the Industry 4.0 for Indonesia is

expected to provide an opportunity to revitalize the

Indonesian manufacturing sector and become a way

to accelerate the achievement of Indonesia's vision of

becoming the world's ten largest economy. According

to him until 2016, the manufacturing industry

contributed 20% of Indonesia's GDP and opened

more than 14 million jobs.

Furthermore it is said that to revitalize the

manufacturing industry, Indonesia is committed to

accelerating the implementation of Industry 4.0. This

is expected to multiply labor productivity, so as to

increase competitiveness and lift the global export

market share. With the existence of higher exports, it

will automatically open up more jobs, so that

domestic consumption becomes stronger and in turn

Indonesia will be able to become one of the top 10

countries in the world economy. This is in line with

what was stated by Hamdan (2018) which states that

the Industrial Revolution 4.0 has an increasing

influence on the economy. Various sectors open

opportunities for entrepreneurship so that MSMEs are

increasing rapidly. This then influences

entrepreneurship so that the expected economic

independence will be realized.

One of those who felt the change was the Jepara wood

carving industry. Jepara is one of the regencies in

Central Java which is located on the north coast of the

island of Java. The land area of Jepara Regency is

1,004,132 km2 with a coastline of 72 km. Jepara

Regency consists of 14 sub-districts which are further

Kartono, B. and Widyastuti, .

Jepara Wood Carving In Industry 4.0 Era.

DOI: 10.5220/0008527000830087

In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Intermedia Arts and Creative Technology (CREATIVEARTS 2019), pages 83-87

ISBN: 978-989-758-430-5

divided into 183 villages and 11 sub-districts. Jepara

is known by the public as an area of wood carving

industry. Communities in this area have long been

known to have talents in the field of carving and make

the skills they have as a source of living livelihoods

(Kurniawan & Widyastuti, 2018).

The development of Jepara carving art cannot be

separated from the role of workers (engravers). From

the skilled hands of the engravers, various shapes and

motifs can be realized. Jepara Carving as a carving art

product has spread in various regions and the world

(Alamsyah, 2018). It's just that at this time the

children and young generation of Jepara are not very

interested in carving. Not only school children, but

the younger generation also does not want to learn

carving. This is certainly very concerning for the

survival of Jepara carving arts (Maswan, 2014).

Industry 4.0 has been regarded as a new industrial era

so that this study wants to find out how far the

industrial revolution era 4.0 has impacted creative

industries of wood carving in Jepara so that effective

solutions can be obtained for the development of

young wood carving creations. The purpose of this

study is to document and analyze the behavior of

wood carving actors who have adopted industry 4.0

and utilize technological advances and automation as

an effort to transform technology to improve the

creation of quality carving works from aspects of

product distribution and aspects of production

efficiency.

2 RESEARCH METHOD

This study was conducted in the Jepara Woodcraft

Industry. In this study the methodology used was:

literature study, field observations, interviews with

Jepara carvings and Jepara carving documentation.

The challenge of changing the industrial era 4.0

towards wood carving creative actors is expected to

provide answers and understand the impact on the

distribution chain of wood carving products and the

quality of wood carving. The object and design of

Jepara wood carving was studied to understand the

extent of industrial adoption 4.0 in terms of

production, design, and marketing aspects. A

comparison of the use of technology in wood

products currently produced by wood craftsmen to

study the production of new patterns and to

understand the new ways of marketing Jepara

industrial wood handicraft products. In addition, the

perception of wood carvers about the presence of

industrial era 4.0 is related to the adequacy of income

from craft activities. In-depth interviews were taken

to understand the views of the engravers so that they

would obtain a description of the motivation of the

carvers to develop the sustainability of jepara carving

handicraft products.

3 RESULT AND DISCUSSION

Industry 4.0 is considered as the latest stage of the

development of the industrial revolution which has

had a lot of influence on changing patterns of

industrial production in many countries. Rapid

technological development and supported by the

demands of the industry to be able to reduce high

labor costs made the concept of Industry 4.0 related

to aspects of industrial production patterns, including

manufacturing, production distribution, business

models, products and product services. Nevertheless,

the results of observations in the field and the results

of interviews with the Jepara carving industry found

that the application of technology was still not widely

used in the production of Jepara carving crafts.

Although there are already some artisans who use

laser technology to do cutting in making their work,

this is only used by a small number of artisans. This

is because not all craftsmen have the ability to utilize

renewable technology. In addition, there are still

many artisans who have traditional thinking concepts

and are less willing to open themselves to

technological advancements.

Engravers who have made use of technological

advances in making their works include Jainuddin,

who is from the village of Mantingan. Jainuddin,

utilizing technology in the production process of his

work mainly in laser cut. In addition, Jainuddin also

uses technology to market his work. According to

him, the most trendy market demand today is custom

wedding accessories, ranging from dowry boxes,

classic or digital albums and wedding souvenirs in the

form of key chains. As for the foreign market share

according to Jainuddin, the current trend is for kitchen

ware mainly for restaurants and cafes. In addition,

Jainudin uses technology that is still limited to

production which has small dimensions.

The results of interviews with Kandik from Sukodono

Hamlet also found that the application of industry-

CREATIVEARTS 2019 - 1st International Conference on Intermedia Arts and Creative

based 4.0 technology concepts must have a positive

and negative impact depending on the application.

According to him, even though the technology has

been used in making engraving products, it still needs

manual engraving, so it must be combined between

technology and manual.

The progress of a nation's civilization in this case

changes the concept of developing a technology-

based industry as much as possible, indeed it must be

in line with the development of its human character.

This is in accordance with what was stated by

Suwardana (2017) who stated that the industrial

revolution which prioritizes the value of the economic

growth of the community through empowerment will

be able to build harmony and synergy cooperation in

order to develop the economy of the community. This

is in line with the opinion of Boourdeou (Suwardana,

2017) which states that economic capital is not capital

of all capital. But building the mental community is

an important economic potential in the social

structure, so that it can be used as a basis for moving

the industry's progress in a beneficial direction.

Industry 4.0 is also expected to be able to help in our

daily lives and produce work decisions in a more

appropriate industry. Currently industry 4.0 has

changed many aspects of the economy, work, and

lifestyle in society. The principle of work is a

combination of physical technology and digital

technology through analysis, artificial intelligence,

cognitive technology, and the internet of think.

The results of the interview also found that some of

the other engravers also seemed to take advantage of

technological advancements, except that they were

still limited to marketing their work. Engravers who

use social media in marketing their works include

Yanto and Roni. Both of these engravers basically

accept the presence of technology, only in the

production process they still rely on manual

processes. Nevertheless, they use technology by

marketing their work through online business on

social media. In addition, according to Roni, the use

of social media to showcase and market the results of

his work is also useful to find out consumer tastes

about the product so that it is expected to be able to

encourage him to be more creative in making carved

products and designs.

Furthermore, Roni said that the value of the work also

depends on the exclusivity of a work. The manual

touch of the engraver makes a work look smooth and

rough, it looks detailed details and especially if the

product produced is limited in number, of course it is

the main feature of the exclusivity of a product. This

is also one of the reasons why the carving industry

players seem less willing to take advantage of

industry 4.0 technological advances in making their

engraving products. Even so, it must be admitted that

the manufacture of products manually will certainly

make the price of goods higher because it will take a

lot of time in the process, so it seems the price given

is also less competitive than if the product is made by

machinery at the factory.

Another thing that needs to be considered is the

sustainability of Jepara carving handicraft

production, considering that the main production

material is wood, so the impact on the environment

must be considered, especially on the availability of

raw materials. So it is also necessary to consider the

use of production waste in order to become a product

that can also be used.

Jepara Wood Carving In Industry 4.0 Era

Figure 1: Wood carving products in Jepara that adopt

technology laser cut production pattern (photo source

Jainudin)

Figure 2: Jepara wood carving products that utilize

Sosmedia Facebook and online media for its marketing

strategy (Source of Facebook: Yanto)

4 CONCLUSION

The findings of the study indicate that the utilization

of the application of Industry 4.0 of Jepara industrial

wood carving products has not been widely adopted

in production and marketing. In the production

pattern, small-scale production repetition jobs see less

potential in applying Industrial 4.0 technology in

manufacturing logistics, while jobs with large

dimensions such as furniture manufacturing have not

seen a higher potential for use.

The results of the study also showed that the Jepara

wood carving industry began to adapt to the industrial

era 4.0. The process of making wood carving

products that are considered too slow and lack of

product innovation makes the need for new

approaches to accelerate the process of making wood

carving products, optimize product development to

production and ensure competitive production costs.

The challenge is to find the right balance between

optimal quality standards, the ability to deliver

products quickly, and competitive pricing strategies.

The sustainability of Jepara carving handicraft

production also requires sufficient material reserves

and causes significant waste. So it is necessary to

think of a strategy so that existing production waste

can also be used optimally.

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Jepara Wood Carving In Industry 4.0 Era