Barong Landung and Beryl de Zoete
In boxes, suspended in a state of care and conservation, two seemingly separate collections at the Horniman Museum sit in storage, awaiting for the day to be re-animated and re-united.
This post explores the connection between these two associated collections and how one in part brought about the birth of another. As well as considering how they still shape and inform one another today.
Photograph of Jero Luh Puppet Mask 2010.80, Horniman Museum stores 2021
The first Collection - Barong Landung
Two Balinese Barong Landung masks featured below, were commissoned by Dr Fiona Kerlogue, who was Deputy Keeper of Anthropology at the Horniman Museum from 2001. The masks were created specifically for an exhibition which Dr Kerlogue curated titled, 'Bali: Dancing for the Gods' - 16th April 2011 to 8th January 2012.
Jero Gede Puppet Mask https://www.horniman.ac.uk/object/2010.78
Jero Luh Puppet Mask https://www.horniman.ac.uk/object/2010.80
Jero Gede Jero Luh
A braille file is available to downloand of the Barong Landung masks, this can be printed out on a braille printer to create a tactile diagram.
The Second Collection
The masks were inspired by multiple existing objects in the horniman collection including Beryl de Zoete's photography collection which was bequethed to the Horniman in 1960's. This includes over 2,500 photographs which were taken by Beryl in Bali in the 1930's. It is important to state that it is not possible to solely attribute individual authorship directly to Beryl as she worked closely with with her co- author and creative researcher partner, Walter Spies.
Further to this Fiona Kerlogue also develop a programme of events for the exhibiton on Bali, showcasing music and dance. Specifically Balinese Gamelan, a bronze orchestra which accompanies dances and ceremonies in Bali, as well as collaborating with the famous balinese dancer Ni Made Pujarati who danced at the exhibition.
In a Museum Ethnographers review Julie Botticello uses a quote directly from the Horniman website which describes the theme of the exhibition. The focus of the exhibtion was to explore, '...the culture of Bali and in particular the way moral values and a respect for the environment are passed from one generation to the next through stories and dance of Balinese Hinduism'. {1}
The link between the environment and Barong Landung is highlighted in each of the posts in this Blog.
Image part of the Gamelan set at the Horniman Museum currently in storage, this collection will be available as part of the Handling collection from September 2021. 'The Horniman has the only Balinese Gamelan angklung in London' London.https://www.horniman.ac.uk/workshop/gamelan/
Link to the Beryl de Zoete Films of Bali, links to the Horniman online archive https://cms.thehorniman.net/object/ARC/DEZ/FILM
and the collection of objects and photographs https://www.horniman.ac.uk/agent/agent-6690
Books and Objects
In the book titled 'Dance and Drama in Bali, by Beryl de Zoete and Walter Spies they dedicate a chapter 3, titled 'The Drama of Magic', to Barong.
Beryl starts the chapter by explaining that Barong is a masked dance and provides an insight into all the different varieties of Barong of which the majority are based on the form of wild beasts, all having a social and religious significance.
matjan - tiger
Bangkal - wild boar
Gadjah - elephant
Singa - lion
Lemboe - cow
Keket - 'correponds to no known animal, but is universally known a Banaspati Raja, Sovereign Lord of the Forest. (de Zoete, 1938) [2}
'For the Barong is at once the most familiar and the most obscure figure in Balinese dance -drama, the most concrete and the most abtruse, the most typically Balinese and the most universal. ' (de Zoete, 1938) [3}
In the quote above Beryl sets the scene forhow the Barong cerememonies were percieved by Westerners. The Barong dances have religious and social significance, focused on eradicating evil spirits by using magical ancestral powers to restore the cosmic balance, a philosophy attributed to the Hindu Balinese concept of Rwa Bhineda.
MASKS - TO - GIANTS
Barong Landung differs to the other Barong listed above. Barong Landung, consists of two seperate giant puppet effigies representing the ancestral figures of Jero Gede and Jero Luh. The masks with the object numbers 2010.78 and 2010.80 featured above from the Horniman collection are examples of those worn by the the giant bamboo, wooden and ornately dressed puppets. Information on how they are created, the myths, stories and contemporary adaptations linked to Barong Landung can be read on the Wiki Hornimania.
'Barong consisting of two giant puppets, Jero Gede (Big Person) and Jero Luh (Female Person)' BALI The Imaginary Museum, The Photographs of Walter Spies and Beryl de Zoete [4]
Beryl de Zoete refers to the Barong Landung figures briefly in 'Dance and Drama in Bali', projecting onto them an English characterisation of each puppets, as if they were living in a quaint English pastoral rural village setting. This westernised gaze and perception, can be read in her use of tone and visual language in the descriptions of Jero Gede and Jero Luh below.
Jero Gede Jero Luh
'rather resembles a comic drunk of a 'generally rather untidy hair, and
village inn, who would stagger home after an effect of a flowered hat, like an
midnight, very amorous and dissapointed. English maiden aunt in her garden.'
at his cold reception'. (de Zoete, 1938). [5] (de Zoete, 1938) [6]
De Zoetes photographs can be viewed as a compedium of images with supporting text in following book titled Bali The Imaginary Museum, by Michael Hitchcock and Lucy Norris who was the Documentation Manager at the Horniman Museum and Gardens.
This book was published in co-operation with the Horniman Museum and Gardens, London by Oxford University Press. Other contributers included in the acknowledgements section are; Fiona Kerlogue the curator of Anthropology at the Horniman who was inspired by in part by the Beryl De Zoete collection to curate the Horniman exhibition titled Bali Dancing for the Gods 2011 for which the two Barong Langung Masks featured above were commission, for more information on the maker and the exhibition on Wiki Hornimania.
[7] Cover of the Bali The Imaginary Museum Photographs of Walter Spies and Beryl de Zoete containing photographs from the Horniman Museum and Gardens collection.
[8] 'Two puppet versions of Jero Gede and Jero Luh'
[9] Image from Bali: The Imaginary Museum showing smaller masked figures accompanying the giant Barong Landung.
References
[1 ] Botticello J. (2012). Journal of Museum Ethnography,(25), 178-183. from http://www.jstor.org/stable/41710662
[2] Spies, W. and De Zoete, B,. 2002. Dance and Drama in Bali. Hong Kong: Periplus
[3] Ibid
[4] Hitchcock, M., Norris. L, Spies, W. and De Zoete, B.,1995. Bali The Imaginary Museum Photographs of Walter Spies and Beryl de Zoete, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press
[4] Spies, W. and De Zoete, B,. 2002. Dance and Drama in Bali. Hong Kong: Periplus
[6] Ibid
[7] Hitchcock, M., Norris. L, Spies, W. and De Zoete, B.,1995. Bali The Imaginary Museum Photographs of Walter Spies and Beryl de Zoete, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press
[8] Photograph Hitchcock, M., Norris. L, Spies, W. and De Zoete, B.,1995. Bali The Imaginary Museum Photographs of Walter Spies and Beryl de Zoete, Kuala Lumpur: Oxford University Press.
[9] Ibid
Comentarios