32nd Bali Arts Festival 2010

Posted by Bali Tours on June 12, 2010
Category : Blog

President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono called on Bali people and regional government to benefit from the annual Bali Arts Festival a forum to develop creativity and innovation.

“Make the festival not only a mere arts party but a forum for cultural dialogues that are enlightening and educative,” the President was quoted by Antara at the opening of the 32nd Bali Cultural Festival in Denpasar on Saturday evening. Yudhoyono also expected the festival to further promote tourism in Bali in particular and in the country in general.

“Let us present the products of our artists and cultural workers to attract tourists so that they could enjoy our various cultures and multi-cultural expressions,” he said. The month-long annual festival is also participated in by foreign arts troupes such as from Japan, the US, Canada, France and India.

The Bali Arts Festival is a full month of daily performances, handicraft exhibitions and other related cultural and commercial activities during which literally the whole of Bali comes to the city to present its offerings of dance, music and beauty. On display are trances from remote mountain slopes, forgotten or recently revived village dances, food and offering contests, classical palace dances, stars of Balinese stage, odd musical performances, “kreasi baru” (new creations) from the dance schools of Denpasar, as well as contemporary choreography and dance companies from other islands and from abroad.

It is a month long revelry that perhaps no other place in the world can put up on such a low budget as the Balinese. Not only is their traditional culture alive and well, but they have a tremendous pride in it.

It begins in the villages, where the seka or cultural groups are selected and organized at the regency level, vie with each other to perform the Arts Festival and thus display in front of a large audience the uniqueness of their village of birth and resting place of their ancestors.

The Bali Arts Festival is the Denpasar cultural event of the year, perhaps it would no be too far fetched to suggest that it is the cultural event of Indonesia. The festival is thus a unique opportunity to see local village culture both “live” and at first hand. Tourists are warmly welcomed.

Source: The Jakarta Post and Bali Art Festival

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