Book Review
Ni Wayan Murni
Kabar Magazine
Travel, Experience, Taste, June-July 2006
Treasures of Bali, A Guide to Museums in Bali
written and edited by Richard Mann
Gateway Books International, 2006
I witnessed this book’s strange birth. The quintessentially English publisher Richard Mann stayed at my Villa a couple of years ago, researching and writing ‘Bali off the Beaten Track’. He came up to me at breakfast one morning and said, ‘Murni, I’ve woken up with the idea of writing the first ever guide book to all the museums of Bali. It’s never been done before.’
Shortly afterwards Richard met Nyoman Gunarsa, probably Bali’s most famous living artist, who is also chairman of the Bali Museums Association. That evening Richard caught up with me in my restaurant and reported his evident excitement, ‘Murni, do you remember my museums guide book idea? You won’t believe it, but Nyoman Gunarsa supports it and wants me to publish it.’ It was a curious coincidence that that both men, from opposite sides of the world, had the same wish at the same time.
That was a year ago. It has been a lot of work, but the book has now appeared and is glorious. There are twenty-one museums in Bali, some are private, like the most popular one, Neka Art Museum in Ubud, which is encyclopaedic in its range of paintings, and others are government run, like the little known Museum Gedong Kirtya in Singaraja, which houses a collection of 6,753 traditional lontar palm leaf manuscripts. The museums are all over the island, although most are concentrated in the Ubud area, which is not surprising as Ubud is the cultural heart of Bali. The major museums have twelve pages each and the smaller ones have one page each.
I am not aware of any guide book that even mentions the wide range of museums that exist here. It is a great contribution. There is a helpful list of details for each one: address, telephone, fax, e-mail, web site, opening hours, facilities and how to get there. Every museum has a floor plan and there are useful maps at the end of the book showing how to find all the places featured. The cover is a beautiful painting from the Kerta Gosa Museum.
Richard has visited all of them several times and has composed a narrative describing their collections. Numerous stunning photographs illustrate examples from the collections. In some cases there are interviews with the museums’ owners, which outline their various philosophies, perspectives and aims.
Of course, most, if not all, of the museums do not sell their art works. With your appetites whetted by seeing all this beauty and wanting to own a piece of Balinese culture yourself, it is great that the book also contains details and descriptions of Bali’s leading galleries, which sell antiques, paintings, textiles, sculptures, masks and other treasures. I am very proud that this book features my own shop in Ubud among them.
Treasures of Bali
