Exhibition explores fascinating 'Ramayana'<\/p>\n
I Wayan Juniartha, The Jakarta Post, Ubud, Bali<\/p>\n
Once a year, if you are lucky, an art museum nearby will come up
\nwith a good exhibition, one that fills you with a sense of
\nwonder, excitement, and, simultaneously, satisfy your thirst for
\nboth the trivial and the important.<\/p>\n
This year, it is the Neka Art Museum in Ubud that still has
\nthe guts to pamper to art enthusiasts with that kind of
\nexhibition. In cooperation with the KOMANEKA Fine Art Gallery,
\nthe museum has organized Ramayana in the Arts of Asia; Bali,
\nIndia, Thailand and Burma exhibition, which will runs from Aug.
\n25 to Sept. 11.<\/p>\n
With Bali's art scene increasingly dominated by art
\nexhibitions featuring megalomaniac painters only wanting either
\nto sell their works at the highest price possible or getting
\nthemselves up into the shallow, yet, coveted celebrity status, or
\nby aspiring young painters too poor to elude the quick, cold cash
\ntraps laid by the so-called Mafia art collectors, the Ramayana
\nexhibition is truly the refreshing breeze most people have been
\nwaiting for for so long.<\/p>\n
\"We would like to commemorate the Neka Art Museum's 20th
\nanniversary in a way that will remind us of the principal
\npurposes of it's existence, which, among other things, are to
\npreserve the legacy of our cultural richness, and to promote
\ncultural literacy and understanding. I believe this exhibition
\nwill serve that purposes,\" museum founder Suteja Neka said.<\/p>\n
The exhibition features around 100 paintings from the private
\ncollection of the museum's curator Garret Kam, who for years has
\ntraveled extensively across Asia to satisfy his curiosity for the
\nage-old love affair between the Ramayana story and the
\nregion's various art-forms.<\/p>\n
\"Limited research time and lack of local language proficiency
\nprevented me from truly getting as deep as I wanted to. War is
\nanother major obstacle. In Cambodia, for example, when I visited
\nthat country, 90 percent of it's artists had been wiped out by
\nthe Khmer Rouge, and I only managed to find, and interview one
\nmask-maker,\" Garret said.<\/p>\n
\"In other places, I could get my hand to the local text of
\nRamayana, but failed to acquire the painting that depict the
\ntext's variation,\" he added.<\/p>\n
To solve the last problem, in 1994 Garret started trying to
\nconvince the Balinese traditional painters at Kamasan village to
\nportray stories from Ramayana texts of foreign origins, like
\nThailand's version or Cambodia's version of Ramayana.<\/p>\n
He began feeding the local artists with various interesting
\nvariations of stories, which could not be found in the Balinese's
\nGeguritan Ramayana and Kidung Ramayana.<\/p>\n
Initially, it was a difficult thing to do. But, eventually,
\nmany Kamasan painters, including the 56-year-old master-painter
\nof Kamasan style I Nyoman Mandra, could not resist the temptation
\nof experimenting with the new stories.<\/p>\n
In the exhibition, 50 Kamasan style paintings are featured
\nalongside 22 Indian Patachitra (paintings made with mineral and
\nvegetable pigments on cloth thickly primed with tamarind seed
\nglue and powdered seashell) of Orissa, and Madhubani (paintings
\nmade on the walls of houses using earth and vegetable pigments,
\nor made with pigments mixed with milk on commercially primed
\ncloth) of Mithila, Bihar.<\/p>\n
It also exhibits several Shwegyido (decorative cloth applique
\npanels done on velvet with embroidery, colored cords, sequins,
\nbeads, glass and rhinestones, figures usually are stuffed with
\ncotton padding for a three-dimensional effect) of Mandalay,
\nBurma.<\/p>\n
Art enthusiasts will also have a chance to view Indian
\nTalapatta and Balinese Prasi, both are etched drawings on dried
\npalm leaves.<\/p>\n
An avid researcher, Garret finally presented his findings on
\nRamayana to the public in 2000, when he published the 292-page
\nbook Ramayana in the Arts of Asia, which is the base of the
\nongoing exhibition.<\/p>\n
Previously, Garret has also authored and co-authored several
\nbooks, including Perceptions of Paradise: Images of Bali in the
\nArts (1993), From Ritual to Romance: Paintings Inspired by Bali
\n(1994), The Development of Painting in Bali: Selections from the
\nNeka Art Museum (1998),<\/p>\n
\"The Mahabharata is only known in India, Java, and Bali.
\nFurthermore, the story has undergone only a slight, if not at
\nall, variations in those three regions. On the contrary, Ramayana
\nhas traveled to almost every region in Asia, and the story also
\nhas undergone several major changes, which resulted in the
\nexistence of various interesting variations of the story
\nnowadays,\" Garret said, justifying his fascination of Ramayana.<\/p>\n
In his book, Garret recorded more than 150 different Ramayana
\nliterary texts currently in existence in at least 37 regions all
\nover Asia -- from the predominantly-Hindu areas in India, to
\nChina, Japan, Mindanao, Tibet up into the predominantly-Islam
\narea of Kashmir, Pakistan and Persia.<\/p>\n
The early 4th century Paumachariyam, the Jain religion's
\nadaptation of the Ramayana epic, is the obvious example of one of
\nthe story's major variations. Since killing is a sin in Jainism,
\nthen, instead of Rama, it is his younger brother Lakshmana, who
\nfights Ravana to the death. Consequently, Lakshaman is punished
\nfor the killing he committed. In Paumachariyam, Rama and Sita
\nremain celibate, which is a Jain virtue, adding doubts not only
\nto Sita's chastity during her captivity, but also regarding the
\npaternity of the sons born to her.<\/p>\n
\"In Maharadia Lavana, the Maranao people of Mindanao's version
\nof Ramayana, Rama succeeds in claiming Sita back before the war
\neven starts. However, Rama decides to continue with the war in
\norder to punish Ravana,\" Garret said.<\/p>\n
Some of these interesting variations are presented in the
\nexhibition. For example, in the work by the 36-year-old Pande
\nWayan Sumatra and his 62-year-old mother Ni Made Masih. Sumatra
\nmade the composition and details, while his mother gave the final
\ntouch of coloring to the painting.<\/p>\n
They took up an episode from Kamban Iramawataram, the Tamil's
\nRamayana, which portrayed the abduction of Rama and Lakshmana by
\nMahirawana, the powerful son of Ravana. Both heroes were held
\ncaptive inside Mahirawana's magic box. Needless to say that this
\nepisode does not exist in the Balinese texts of Ramayana.<\/p>\n
\"Since the episode is portrayed in our traditional Kamasan-
\nstyle painting, it certainly will make it easier for the Balinese
\npeople to comprehend it. And, that's exactly what this exhibition
\nis trying to achieve; to communicate the diverse cultural
\nrichness of the Ramayana text to the general public,\" Suteja
\nNeka said.<\/p>\n
The Kamasan master-painter I Nyoman Mandra, on the other hand,
\nfeatures his work in an episode from Reamker, the Khmer and
\nCambodia's Ramayana, which depicts the unfortunate Sita being
\nbanished by her husband Rama, after the latter found out that
\nSita has kept a portrait of Ravana under the couple's mattress.
\nWell, a bit soap-opera like, but the painting is beautiful,
\nnonetheless.<\/p>\n
The Ramayana epic originated in India, where the poet Valmiki
\nmay have composed it in Sanskrit sometime between 400-200 BC.
\nValmiki's Ramayana represents a compilation of various oral and
\nliterary traditions, including Vedic myths from the 12th century
\nBC. Nearly 25,000 verses are divided into around 700 chapters and
\ngrouped into seven books.<\/p>\n
\"This is the kind of art exhibition that any art enthusiast
\nshould visit. It is rich, diverse, beautiful, and, most
\nimportantly, very informative,\" Bali's noted painter Nyoman
\nErawan said.<\/p>",
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