Gamelan

Peliatan Dance Troupe
16" x 12", oil on canvas paper, 2015

Sekar Jupun is the title of a gamelan performance by the Peliatan Dance Troupe, it was uploaded to YouTube in 2012. The Peliatan Troupe is from Bali, Indonesia. In the context of ancient art history I used this video to talk about a music tradition in south-east Asia dating back to the bronze age. Gamelan, however old it is, doesn't go that far back in time. (The oldest depiction of a gamelan ensemble is found on the walls of the famous 8th century Borobudur temple on Java. According to local lore gamelan dates back to the 3rd.) The clip was a substitution for music performed on bronze age bells from China which is rather boring. About a month later I saw the same clip posted on the Facebook page of a friend in Columbus, Ohio. The central figure in the painting is based (again) on a photo by Gerhard Riebicke, photographer of a German nudist movement, taken in 1925. The painting reminds me of a painting by Linda Gall that another friend from Columbus owns. (Love that painting.)