Balinese traditional arts, culture exported to Helsinki

Balinese traditional arts, culture exported to Helsinki

By Putu Wirata

DENPASAR, Bali (JP): With the country still in the grip of the
economic crisis, Indonesia's trade has generally suffered a sharp
decline. Bucking the trend, however, is the trade in arts and
culture, which has become an attractive commodity both in the
local and foreign market. However, to ensure that culture is
effectively promoted, brochures alone will not suffice.

"Of no less importance in (promoting culture) is sending
cultural missions, such as arts exhibitions, to other countries,"
Agung Rai, 44, owner of ARMA museum in Ubud, said. He recently
returned from Helsinki, where a number of works of art from
ARMA's collection, along with other Balinese works of art, are on
display in an exhibition which kicked off on June 12 and will run
until Aug. 22.

Balinese art is no stranger to Finland, with quite a few
Finnish people having visited Bali and purchased Balinese works
of art. The exhibition at Hameenlinna Art Museum is centered
around the theme, Life in Paradise: Balinese Art and Culture.

The exhibition is displaying the works of 41 famous Balinese
artists from ARMA's collection, in addition to a number of
Balinese works of art collected by Finland's National Museum and
a number of Finnish private collectors. The exhibition includes
paintings, old photographs, keris (double-bladed daggers),
leather puppets, statues and woven cloth.

"We are organizing this exhibition not only to promote culture
but also to get across to the Finnish people a concept of
Balinese life," Agung Rai said, adding that many cultural
observers have said the Balinese community and their environment
make up a living museum.

Indeed, the Balinese had no concept of what a museum was until
colonial times, when Kirtya Museum was established in Singaraja,
Buleleng, in 1928 by order of Dutch residency head L.J.J. Caron.
The first museum devoted to paintings was established in Ubud in
the 1970s, while ARMA Ubud saw the light of day in 1996. Agung
Rai intentionally designed his museum as both "a museum and life
itself".

"Painting collections in my museum have their origin in the
life and culture which continues to be preserved and at the same
time develop," he said.

It is this concept which has led the museum to serve not only
as a building to house paintings, but also a stage where children
from Peliatan village, where ARMA is located, can take lessons in
dancing and gamelan.

In this light, the works of art on display at Hameenlinna Art
Museum are arranged to depict the procession of tradition to
modernity.

"In Bali, we are familiar with the tradition of very
beautifully engraved leather puppets. Then there is the tradition
of leather puppet drawing in Kamasan village, which is still
alive and kicking today. However, modern Bali also has painter
Nyoman Gunarsa, to whom leather puppets are the source of
inspiration, but who expresses this inspiration in spontaneous
freedom and with modern esthetics," Agung Rai said, adding that
there was a clear relationship between tradition and modernity.
It is a reality that traditional culture still exists in the
lives of the Balinese, who are at the same time heading toward
modernity.

"As the cultural leap toward modernity does not do away with
tradition, what you see in the museum is really the reflection of
what you can witness outside of it," he said.

Every time he is invited to organize exhibitions abroad -- in
Japan, Australia, the United States and Europe, to mention only a
few places -- he consistently clings to his concept of the
coexistence of tradition and modernity.

"It is not enough for me simply to display items from ARMA's
collection. I also find it necessary to display the culture which
serves as the source of inspiration for the items in the
collection. In this way, cultural promotion and appreciation will
effectively take place," he said.

He said the people in Finland had enthusiastically welcomed
the exhibition, the first Balinese art exhibition to be held in
Finland. He said the Balinese art troupe now performing in
Finland was not as complete as the one he usually took with him
to overseas exhibitions. Last year, he said, the gamelan group
from Peliatan village performed for close to two months in a
small city near Tokyo, and every day hundreds of Japanese came to
the performance. "Even though we are in the grip of the economic
crisis, we can still export our arts and culture," he said.