My new Balinese keris

[David]

Anthony, why don't you post some photos of your completed new keris.

[Anthony G.]

Originally Posted by David

Anthony, why don't you post some photos of your completed new keris.

I am still making the warangka (dress). Once it is ready, I will display it here. wink. :P

[Anthony G.]

Originally Posted by David

Anthony, why don't you post some photos of your completed new keris.

For your pleasure 😉

[David]

Not sure why members haven't commented yet, but i think this is a beautiful new art keris. Very nice level of craft apparent here.
I will admit that i personally prefer more "legitimate" dhapurs, but your pande did a very nice job with this one and i find it quite attractive.
Is the selut ivory? The wood used in the sarong is lovely. Some close-ups of the dress would be appreciated.

[Jean]

Very beautiful art piece indeed but it does not move me much as a kris, and personally I prefer the old blawong behind it
Regards

[Mickey the Finn]

I am still making the warangka (dress). Once it is ready, I will display it here. wink. :P

I feel compelled to say that I am truly, very seriously impressed. A few years ago, probably resulting from overconfidence due to never having attempted it previously, I began amassing tools and materials with which to start making my own handles and warangka for goloks, knives, and machetes, as well as mendak for keris. I have yet to complete a single functional one of anything.
I'm making a number of a priori assumptions. Your name is Anthony, and based on nothing else, I assume that you are not "native" to Indonesia, and that yadda yadda… I really should know better, because there's this one other English-speaking White Man, whom if I hadn't read about in a number of places before I found this forum...
Really, really nice work, Mr. Anthony... Or maybe that wink was intended to convey some unspoken meaning... In any case, the dress is still admirable in it's workmanship.
Mickey

[Anthony G.]

Originally Posted by Mickey the Finn

I feel compelled to say that I am truly, very seriously impressed. A few years ago, probably resulting from overconfidence due to never having attempted it previously, I began amassing tools and materials with which to start making my own handles and warangka for goloks, knives, and machetes, as well as mendak for keris. I have yet to complete a single functional one of anything.
I'm making a number of a priori assumptions. Your name is Anthony, and based on nothing else, I assume that you are not "native" to Indonesia, and that yadda yadda… I really should know better, because there's this one other English-speaking White Man, whom if I hadn't read about in a number of places before I found this forum...
Really, really nice work, Mr. Anthony... Or maybe that wink was intended to convey some unspoken meaning... In any case, the dress is still admirable in it's workmanship.
Mickey

The wink is just a mischief. I am from Singapore and live near Indonesia. This project took a few months from concept to realization. I try not to make it too flashy and took a sample of it from the actual copy in Neka museum, Bali.

I thought to share the final result/works for the world to see and appreciate modern keris making artwork which combines Balinese philosophy (my own view) and modern art work.

[Anthony G.]

Originally Posted by Jean

Very beautiful art piece indeed but it does not move me much as a kris, and personally I prefer the old blawong behind it
Regards

The keris photo was taken in the room of my friend who owns this antique blawong. A beautiful piece indeed.

[Anthony G.]

Originally Posted by David

Not sure why members haven't commented yet, but i think this is a beautiful new art keris. Very nice level of craft apparent here.
I will admit that i personally prefer more "legitimate" dhapurs, but your pande did a very nice job with this one and i find it quite attractive.
Is the selut ivory? The wood used in the sarong is lovely. Some close-ups of the dress would be appreciated.

The wood for warangka is burl wood from sena and ebony gandar. Selut is bone.

[A. G. Maisey]

I think sena is what we call sonokembang in Jawa.

[Interested Party]

All I can say is wow! To my understanding you made the dress, does that include the pendok as well? I hope my upcoming question barrage of my impressions isn't bad manners or overwhelming. I really like the burl of the, would we call it a wrangka or a sampir? Burl can be very difficult to carve and your detail is crisp. Is that a sunflower as the main motif in the lozenge carved into the burl? If so is there Indian influence on that detail? Does the rest of the lozenge show Dutch influence? Below the carved lozenge the pendok reminds me of chrysanthemums but I can't think of from where. I would love some pictures of the hilt. I can't see what is going on/who it is. Thanks again for showing us this creation. At some point an explanation if it isn't too personal would be interesting as once something is put out into the world as this has been it takes a life of its own separate from the original intent of its creator. The easiest way to explain this for me and at the same time perpetrate the act is to borrow what Auden said of Yeats works upon his death when Yeat's could no longer interpret his own writings:

The current of his feeling failed; he became his admirers.

Now he is scattered among a hundred cities
And wholly given over to unfamiliar affections,
To find his happiness in another kind of wood
And be punished under a foreign code of conscience.
The words of a dead man
Are modified in the guts of the living.


Finally a possible epiphany I had while writing this: If the keris simply represents a house for preferred spirits to dwell in not an exact representation, thus the wide variations in representations of traditional forms, of the spirits themselves, I wonder if that is not why there was a certain secretive nature to keris culture as too many eyes on an object could confuse the object's inter life?

[David]

Originally Posted by Interested Party

All I can say is wow! To my understanding you made the dress, does that include the pendok as well?

I am pretty sure that Anthony didn't make this dress. He did, however, commission it.
Thanks for the close-ups Anthony. The silver work is beautiful. I'm afraid i see Bali work and motifs here. I'm not sure about the Dutch influence I.P. mentions. I would think that in some ways anything that is an extension of the Mojopahit can be said to have an Indian influence somewhere in its roots, but again i see Bali work here, at least in style. Is the mranggi actually in Bali or elsewhere?