One might be expecting reference to the typical clichés surrounding Bali in an exhibition of the same name – Rhonda lusting after Ketut, Schapelle Corby, Eat Pray Love, diplomatic difficulties and the like. However, such distractions aside, Fremantle Arts Centre’s ‘BALI: Return Economy’ does away with clichés and idealisation, highlighting the wealth of artistic talent coming out of Bali with artists addressing local culture, politics and history with great deftness and subtlety.
As part of the ‘Perth International Arts Festival’, the exhibition focuses on the significant link between Bali, Western Australia and the art produced by both. Works in the form of video, political cartoons, wayang (traditional Javanese theatre) paintings, and contemporary Balinese art are featured in this expansive exhibition, which has the honour of being one of very few displays of Balinese art shown in Australia. “Surprisingly, given our close links with Indonesia, there have been few survey shows of Balinese artists in Western Australia and Balinese art has been largely ignored by WA public collections,” co-curators Ric Spencer and Chris Hill said. “More than 400,000 West Australians, around one in seven of us, visited Bali in 2012… Bali has today become a travel destination of choice for West Australians.”
Twenty six Balinese and Western Australian artists are represented in the exhibition, all who have at some point interacted, lived, collaborated or exhibited with the other. The curators engaged in extensive preparations for the exhibition, undertaking a number of research trips in order to handpick works from local artists. The exhibition comprises a combination of commissioned and existing works, as well as those selected from the collections of Western Australian galleries. Included are works by established and emerging artists, with I Wayan Bendi, Mangku Ketut Liyer and cartoonist Jango Pramartha being a few of the better-known.
In addition, there are some collaborative works on show in ‘BALI: Return Economy’. A drawing installation by Bali artist I Wayan Sujana Suklu and Perth artist Paul Trinidad is the culmination of an ongoing collaboration between the pair since 2012. Displays of the work of Western Australian artists John Fawcett and John Darling reveal a significant connection to Bali (Darling lived in Bali for 20 years), while photographer Toni Wilkinson’s series inspired by a trip to Bali is also on show. Wilkinson’s photographs are a thought-provoking look at the relationship between Bali and its visitors, and well worth a look.
‘BALI: Return Economy’ does not pretend to be a comprehensive display of ‘Balinese art’. Nor does it subscribe to clichés, or controversy. It is this notion of exchange and collaboration, inherent in the title, that is the focus of the exhibition – an important focus. As the curators so eloquently put it; “In ‘BALI: return economy’ there is a sense of the closing space between a modern country and its traditions, the pressures of development and a desire to show the island’s culture to masses of tourist hordes – and this leads to artists who are proactively engaged in working within this space to build new forms of politically and environmentally engaged art.”
Fremantle Arts Centre
31 January to 27 March, 2014
Western Australia
Ketut Teja Astawa, Sterile Environment, 2013, acrylic on canvas, 150 x 120cm
Mangku Ketut Liyer, Tunggu tasku (Waiting for inspiration), 2000, ink and acrylic on canvas, 98 x 67cm
Courtesy the artists and Fremantle Arts Centre, Western Australia
