COLOR MEANING IN KAMASAN PAINTING
COLOR MEANING IN KAMASAN PAINTING
(presented during Truly Bagus Project on 16th – 20th of August 2010 in seminar on 18th of August 2010 in The University of Western Australia (UWA) Australia)
BY
PUTU AGUS BRATAYADNYA
FACULTY OF FINE ARTS AND DESAIN
INDONESIAN INSTITUTE OF THE ART
OF DENPASAR
2010
ABSTRACT
Calour meaning of God Figures in Kamasan Painting
.
Semantics, the study of meaning, stand at the very centre of linguistic quest to understand the natural of language and human abilities. Why? Because expressing meanings is what languages are all about. Semantics concern is to shed light on the relationship between language and culture or more accurately, between languages and cultures, which are socialized into the values, belief systems, and practices of their culture. For example, red has many meaning, if we are talking about red at traffic lamp, it have meaning “stop”, but if talking about red in Indonesia national flag, it has meaning “courage” and etc.
In Balinese painting especially in Classic painting such as Kamasan painting, this kind of painting was established since long time ago, in 17 century and a lot of themes is talking about God stories. Colour in that issue uses as symbol of God figures, which his function and philosophy that the painter want explain.
Key words: Semantic, Kamasan painting, God figures
1. Background and problem
1.1 Background
If we are talking about meaning and it is automatically related to sematic. Semantics, the study of meaning, stand at the very centre of linguistic quest to understand the natural of language and human abilities. Why? Because expressing meanings is what languages are all about.
It is same in Bali. Bali is one of most place that has their identity for their local colours. There is many understanding for Balinese colours like concepts of Tri Datu (3 colour concepts) until Nawa Sanga (9 colour concepts) and those become a phenomenon because that colours concepts will have consideration of meaning and message in Bali, especially in “art” because from art the artist explain and transfer their knowlwdge with message in their work.
1.2 Scope of problem
Colour meaning of God figures in Kamasan Painting
1.3 Method:
Library Research
1.4 Scope of Study
This study is focused in Colour meaning of God Figures in Kamasan painting in general, included knowledges of others Balinese concepts that support this study and also as a glance for workshop about Kamasan Painting from Indonesian Institute of the Arts of Denpasar/ISI Denpasar
2. DISCUSSION
Understanding of Colour Meaning of God Figures in Kamasan Painting paper is started to give the clean understanding of: 2.1. Kamasan Painting Style., 2.2. God Figures Concept., 2.3. Balinese Colour., 2.4. And the last is about Balinese Colour Concept
2.1. Kamasan Painting Style.
Classic Balinese art painting is fomous with name Kamasan Style is a painting style that established in Balinese Hindu period, after Balinese art prehistory period and before Balinese Hindu period. (Sulastianto, 2010: 5). Nowsday there is three (3) concept of puppet painting style: 2.1.1. Classic Balinese art painting and in other words it is called Kamasan Painting style., 2.1.2. Kamasan style of modern puppet art painting., 2.1.3. Contemporary puppet art painting.
2. DISCUSSION
Understanding of Colour Meaning of God Figures in Kamasan Painting paper is started to give the clean understanding of: 2.1. Kamasan Painting Style., 2.2. God Figures Concept., 2.3. Balinese Colour., 2.4. And the last is about Balinese Colour Concept
2.1. Kamasan Painting Style.
Classic Balinese art painting is fomous with name Kamasan Style is a painting style that established in Balinese Hindu period, after Balinese art prehistory period and before Balinese Hindu period. (Sulastianto, 2010: 5). Nowsday there is three (3) concept of puppet painting style: 2.1.1. Classic Balinese art painting and in other words it is called Kamasan Painting style., 2.1.2. Kamasan style of modern puppet art painting., 2.1.3. Contemporary puppet art painting.
2.2 God Figures.
In Hindu Religion, God is one, in Balinese Hindu he is called with name, “Ida Sang Hyang Widhi Wasa” and he has a lot (totally 33, according Hindu holy book, Veda) of manifestations related of his functions but here it focused in Gods who has colour has their identity or symbol that is Tri Kono/Tri Murthi, Panca Warna and Nawa Sanga.
2.3 Balinese Colours
Balinese colours are the colour, which is from traditional material that usually used in Bali and without international style colour. They are:
Ancur is from oil of fish and its colour is white. Ancur can bought in Chinese iron shop and it used for glue.
White is from animal horns and bone , which are fired, and mixed with ancur (glue), then crushed on plate until soft and then mixed again with enough water.
Yellow Gold is from from atal (chalk/lime stone) mixed with ancur (glue)
Dark red is from kencu (lipstick imported from China) mixed with ancur (glue)
Blue is from taum leaf mixed with ancur.
Brown is from brown pere stone mixed with ancur.
Black is from jelaga (charcoal) and ancur (glue)
Grey/mangsi banyu is from jelaga (charcoal) with ancur (glue) and mixed with enough water.
Dark green is from the mixing atal /yellow colour ( from yellow chalk/lime stone) with mangsi banyu/grey.
Light green is from the mixing of blue with yellow gold.
Pink/Dadu is from dark red mixed with white and ancur (glue)
Light yellow is from Yellow gold mixed with white and ancur (glue)
2.4 There is many Balinese Colour Concepts, started with,. 2.4.1 Tri Kono ( 3 colours),. 2.4.2 Panca Warna Which is consists of five (5) colours,. 2.4.3 And the last is Nawa Sanga Colour Concepts. that consist of 9 colours concepts.
The first we are going to discuss about tri kono and this concept made from three (3) main colour from getih (blood), areng (charcoal) and pamor (chalk/lime stone). This colour concepts was already consideration for Balinese as their medium for their ceremony, for example kober and pengider-ider. This colour concept, if it related to concept of God figures is popular with name Tri Murthi, which has concept with red for Brahma, Black for Visnu and White for Shiva.
| Colour | RED | BLACK | WHITE |
| Balinese name | Bang/barak | Ireng | Petak |
| From | Blood | Charcoal | Chalk/Lime Stone |
| Symbols | Birth | Life | Death |
| God | Brahma | Visnu | Shiva |
The second, concept of panca warna consists of five (5) colours, that is black, white, red, yellow and all colour. This concept just taking the main direction of Balinese philosophy, north, east, south, west and center. The using of this colouring concept can we see also when offering ceremony that uses five chicken, which has the same colour with the direction colouring concept. (i.e red chicken is take in the south position).
| Colour | BLACK | WHITE | RED | YELLOW | ALL COLOUR |
| Balinese name | Ireng | Petak | Bang/barak | Jenar | brumbun |
| From | Charcoal | Chalk/Lime Stone | Kencu mixed with ancur | Atal mixed with ancur | Mixid of all traditional balinese colour |
| Direction | North | East | South | East | Center |
| God | Visnu | Shiva | Brahma | Mahadeva | Shiva |
The third colour concept is nawa sanga. This is the biggest colour concepts for Hindu in Bali. This concept is used all eight (8) directions include the center directions, so total there is nine (9) colours concepts for nawa sanga.
| Colour | BLACK | GREY | WHITE | PINK | RED | ORANGE | YELLOW | GREEN | All Colours |
| Balinese name | Ireng/bulu, sikep/selem | Pelung/Klawu | Petak | Dadu | Barak/bang | Kudrang | Kuning | Gadang/Wilis | Brumbun |
| Direction | North | North East | East | South East | South | South West | West | North West | Center |
| God | Visnu | Sambu | Isvara | Maheswara | Brahma | Rudra | Mahadewa | Sangkara | Shiva |
| Temple’s name | Batur Temple | Besakih Temple | Lempuyang Temple | Goa Lawah Temple | Andakasa Temple | Uluwatu Temple | Batukaru Temple | Pulaki Temple | Pusering Jagat Temple |
Besides this, we will know the message from the painting from seeing of God colour figures. We know that the figures in kamasan painting must follow pattern from certain condification as regard, form, size, position, colour, character, body, face and attribute and this condification will clarify the figures character, for example in God figures. In outline, there is two characters, good group (Dharma) and bad group (Adharma) as related of Hindu philosophy, ruabineda, it means two things in our life. The God figures is always beeing good group and they againt with bad group such as Giant figures. In Kamasan painting, the Gods figures usually imaged gorgeous but their pose is static and it is much different with scene of war or hunting, which is full of movement. The using of attribute and colour in figures has a tight symbolic relationship based on the Nawa Sanga knowledge (Sulastianto:13). From those Gods figures concepts, the Kamasan Painters painted the story of Gods and this kind of story is very fomous. One of the reason is, this painting style already established in 17th Christh. In that period art painting has tight connection with kingdom, it means all creativities process was for the suprime King and holy man who be counsellor of the King. The holy man would give spiritual, religious and myth loands knowledge for the painters (Rinu, 2009:2) and from the knowledge, the kamasan painters used their work in painting to transfer what they got from the holy man. It means, painting as a media to explain the message. A lot of Kamasan painters success with their works in that time and the King would give the honour title for painters, “Sangging” (maestro) such as, I Gede Mersadi with his title Sangging Modara.
3. CONCLUSION
After analyzing the data some conclusions can be formulated and presented as follows,
Every Balinese is an artist (Covarrubias, 1976:160 cited in Sulastianto:tt) said like that. It is seen from the connection between art and all aspect in Bali, for example, painting for nawa sanga is used in temple as kober and pengider-ider etc, that every temples in Bali have.
Balinese colours have tight relationship with Gods figures, started with tri kono concept until nawa sanga because relavancy with philosophy and Hindu religion that underlain appeared of those colours.
The Using of Colour meaning of God Figures in Kamasan painting is used as a message from Painters to transfer the knowledge that they got from the holy man and this process is still established in present day because the Kamasan painting still save about Kamasan Painting style and concept until now.
3. BILBIOGRAPHY
Beratha, N.L.S., 2003, Peran Semantik Dalam Penerjemahan, Pidato
Pengenalan Jabatan Guru besar Tetap Dalam Bidang Ilmu Bahasa Inggris Pada Fakultas Sastra Universitas Udayana. Denpasar: Udayana University
Goddard, C., 1997., Semantic Analysis a Practical Introduction. Australia:
The University of New England Armidale.
Remawa., A.G.R. & et al. 2009. Intensitas Visual Warna Bali. Seminar
Akademik FSRD ISI Denpasar. Denpasar 21 Desember 2009.
Remawa., A.G.R. & et al. 2009. Pengembangan Warna Bali Dengan Teknik
Modern Sebagai Upaya Untuk Meningkatkan Nilai Jual Produk Lokal. Denpasar: FSRD ISI Denpasar.
Sulastianto, H. tt. Seni Lukis Bali Klasik Cerlang Budaya Seni Lukis
Nusantara. (serial online), [cited 11st of August 2010]. Available from: http://file.upi.edu/Direktori/
Rinu, N. M., 2009. Seni Lukis Bali Klasik, Keunggulan Dan Pencitraan Seni
Lukis Bali Masa Depan. Seminar Akademik FSRD ISI Denpasar. Denpasar 21 Desember 2009.
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CURRICULUM VITAE
I. PERSONAL DATA
Name : Putu Agus Bratayadnya, S.S., M.Hum.
Place &Date of Birth : Gianyar, August 29th 1982
Sex : Male
Religion : Hindu
Marital Status : Single
Address : Hanoman street, no 51 Ubud-Bali
Email : [email protected]
Web : http://blog.isi-dps.id/bratayadnya
Mobile Phone : 081933048191/0361 975598
II. EDUCATIONAL BACKGROUND
- TK. Darmapatni Denpasar 1989
- SDN 5 Ubud, 1995
- SMPN 1 Ubud , 1998
- SMUN 1 Gianyar , 2001
- Faculty of Letters, Udayana University, 2006
- Post Graduate School, Translation Studies, Udayana University, 2008
III. WORK EXPERIENCE
1. English Lecturer in ISI Denpasar, 2008 up to present
