Vincent van Gogh in Java
Although the world’s most famous artist, Vincent van Gogh, once wrote to this brother Theo that he would like to...
Bruce W. Carpenter
Art Appreciation: Meet Bruce Carpenter
Author and co-author of more than 20 books and numerous articles on Indonesian art, culture and history, Bruce W. Carpenter...
Art & Intellectual Property Rights – Who Owns What?
Although art is essentially useless (you can’t eat or drink it, it provides little shelter and makes bad clothing, and...
Earth Art
The word Earth is synonymous both with the Globe, the third planet in our solar system, and the stuff...
True Gluttons
In Bali the purist embodiment of Greed, one of the most ancient and reviled of the Seven Sins, is found...
Cosmic Art
The Sun, Moon, Planets and Stars have served as the muses of artists, musicians, poets and writers since the beginning...
Forbidden Love Part 3 – Girls Will Have Fun
“Music melts all the separate parts of our bodies together.” Anaïs Nin, Delta of Venus, Erotica 1977. When it comes...
Art & Forbidden Fruit in Bali: Part Two
The prominent role of gay expatriate artists in Bali before the Second World War must have deeply disturbed some members...
Art and Forbidden Fruit in Bali
Part One – Straight Men The artist needs his muse they say. The qualifications for the job are complex and...
Rudolf Bonnet – Son of a Priest from Tampaksiring
This beautiful pastel drawing made in 1929 by the Dutch artist Rudolf Bonnet is remarkable for several reasons. Having arrived...
The Story of a Royal Necklace
Gold, Rubies, Sapphires, Diamonds, History Encrusted with over 70 rubies from Myanmar, diamonds from Borneo and sapphires from India, and...
A Tale of Iko
“This is my earthly life, full of trouble and struggle, and many are my enemies, laughing at me…their words sharper...
Majapahit Terracotta
At its pinnacle in the middle of the 14th century, Truwulan, the East Javanese capital of the puissant Majapahit Empire...
Pieter Ouborg : First Modern Artist in Indonesia
Wars by definition trigger immense changes that spell the collapse of the old and the ushering in of new orders,...
Auke Sonnega – Bali’s First Spiritual Artist
If you happened to be one of the few tourists wandering on Jalan Kaleran, Ubud (in those days there were...
Wayan Kun Adnyana – An Up and Coming Balinese Artist
The contemporary art market has always been a hazardous place populated with commercial cowboys, wannabe experts and Bohemian flotsam and...
Miguel Covarrubias’ Visual Notes
Miguel Covarrubias’ father was a Sunday painter. As a very young child, Miguel liked to sit by his father, watching...
Art and Revolution
S. Sudjojono, 1913-1986 One of the ultimate tools of revolution is art. So, too, revolution ideas often stimulate revolutionary visuals...
The Origins of the Piggy Bank
In the west the Piggy Bank has long been a time-honoured rite of passage, a whimsical but didactic tool for...
Indonesia’ First Celebrity Artist
Raden Saleh Boestaman (c. 1807-1880) This well-known photo of Raden Saleh, Indonesia’s ‘first’ western-style painter was taken in 1870 when...
Presidential Art
Complex, contradictory and politically brilliant, Engineer Sukarno, the first president of the Republic of Indonesia, was a renowned lover of...