Product Description

Balinese Poleng Textile

Material: Cotton
Style: Bali, Indonesia
Sizes: Length 1 m, Width 1 m; Length 2 m, Width 1 m; Length 3 m, Width 1 m
Order Number: T49

Every visitor to Bali notices very quickly the black and white checked cloths, wrapped around guardian statues, pavilions, people, kulkul drums in temples and even trees and stones wherein a spirit dwells. It is dazzling and powerful and has a special meaning for the Balinese: it represents the cosmic duality.

The Balinese see the world in terms of opposites, good and bad, day and night, mountain and sea. This duality forms the whole: one cannot exist without the other. Poleng is the perfect representation of this view.

The squares of equal size are perfect black and perfect white; they intersect and are not parallel. Grey squares contain strands of both and show that you cannot have one without the other. White represents good, the gods and health; black represents evil, the underworld and disease. Poleng comprises them both and so the whole.

For humans, men and women, poleng cloth offers protection. It is sometimes used in temple ceremonies to cover the ground, so that people walking on it will be free of all possible evil spirits.

Which size would you like?

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