In the bustling streets of Indonesia’s big cities, KETOK MAGIC is a well-known workshop for fixing dented cars—often the result of light crashes in dense traffic. In Bahasa Indonesia, ketok means “to knock” (as in a door) or “to beat” (as in a drum or tree trunk). But in Javanese, ketok can take on at least two other meanings, depending on pronunciation: “to cut” (like paper or fabric), or “to appear”, “to seem” (as in a color emerging, or a façade revealing itself). In Indonesia’s fine art history, the word carries a different kind of weight. It surfaces in the phrase jiwa ketok—literally, “the soul revealed”—a term once used to describe the spirit or essence believed to shine through in artworks of the revolutionary era.