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ART AND THE ARTIST THE PLACE OF THE ARTIST IN BALINESE LIFE Artistic property cannot exist in the communal Balinese culture; if an artist invents or copies something that is an interesting novelty, soon all the others are reproducing the new find. Once a sculptor made a little statue representing the larvae of an insect standing upright on its tail; a few weeks later everybody was making them and soon the statue market was flooded with Brancusi-like little erect worms on square bases. Unlike the individualistic art of the West in which the main concern of the artist is to develop his personality in order to create an easily recognizable style as the means to attain his ultimate goal - recognition and fame - the anonymous artistic production of the Balinese, like their entire life, is the expression of collective thought. A piece of music or sculpture is often the work of two or more artists, and the pupils of a painter or a sculptor invariably collaborate with their master. The Balinese artist builds up with traditional standard elements. The arrangement and the general spirit may be his own, and there may even be a certain amount of individuality, however subordinated to the local style. There are definite proportions, standard features, peculiar garments, and so forth to represent a devil, a holy man. a prince, or a peasant, and the personality of a given character is determined, not so much by physical characteristics, but rather by sartorial details. The romantic heroes, Ardjuna, Rama, and Pandji, look exactly alike and can only be recognized by the headdress peculiar to each. A strong differentiation is made between “ fine “ and “ coarse “ characters; Ardjuna, for instance, is refined, with narrow eyes and delicate features, while his brother, the warrior Bhima, has wild round eyes and wears a moustache. He is further identified by his chequered loincloth. The Balinese obtain their artistic standards of beauty from ancient Java, and for centuries there has been only one way to treat a beautiful face; which they have, curiously enough, come to identify with themselves. Once, discussing the facial characteristics of various races with the Regent of Karangasem, a man of high Balinese education, he asked me how I drew a Balinese. He disagreed with my conception and proceeded to draw one himself, a face from the classic paintings and a type that could not be found on the whole island. Within these conventions, Balinese art is realistic without being photographic - that is, without attempting to give the optical illusion of the real thing. Thus there is no perspective and no modelling in painting, and sculpture is highly stylized. They admire technique and good craftsmanship above other points, and when I showed a Balinese friend a beautiful sculpture I had just acquired, he found fault with the minute parallel grooves that marked the strands of hair because in places they ran together. |
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