Thread: Wilah from?
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Old 2nd December 2011, 09:11 PM   #10
A. G. Maisey
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Join Date: May 2006
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When I look at this keris what I believe I see is a plain but good Balinese blade in very sub-standard dress.

There is no doubt in my mind that the blade is Balinese:- the pesi is typically Balinese, and as Harley has noted, what type of hilt other than Balinese will fit it; the pamor is typical coarse Bali pamor, the unetched blade finish typical Balinese, the neat, positive garap typically Balinese. What else could it be but Balinese?

But the dress is a fish of a different feather.

Plain ugly.

As Detlef has commented, it looks as if the carver set out to make a scabbard form of which he only had a very sketchy idea.

The hilt is poorly carved, again it looks as if the maker was running on depleted memory banks.

If it was collected in Bali in the period 1920 to 1940, we are looking at the period when tourism was just beginning in Bali. The puputans had all but extinguished the previous social structure, the Dutch then tried to turn Bali into a living museum, tourism had not developed to anywhere near what we see today, the Balinese craftsmen and artists were coming under the influence of European artists, as well as being influenced by what European tourists wanted. Much of the refinement that we expect to see in Balinese art and craft at the present time is very probably due in great measure to the millions of foreign visitors that Bali admits each year. If we look closely at pre-European influenced Balinese style and art, it is very much closer to the tribal art of various areas in S.E. Asia.

Yes, millions of visitors. Over 2,500,000 arrivals in 2010. That's a big market, and the artisans of Bali do their best to satisfy it.

If we go back to the period between 1920 and 1940 it was a totally different picture. Even in 1966 there were hardly any foreigners in South Bali, and entry and exit was not nearly as easy as it is today.

To a large degree the foreign visitors to Bali have created the art of Bali, or more correctly, European perspectives have been responsible for the development of existing art norms to the point where common people can afford the level of refinement that was once only available to kings and princes.

We could hypothesise about the origins of this scabbard and hilt all day, but my personal opinion is that it was made in Bali, by a carver of no particular talent, however, from what I can see of the pendok, this does not look like Balinese workmanship, nor design. I think the pendok is a later addition.
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