Painting Art and Honesty

ARSIP PRIBADI

I Nyoman Bratayasa, painter and founder of Sanggar Bares, Bali.

Childhood is the golden time to inculcate the values of honesty, togetherness and sharing. I Nyoman Bratayasa instills these values in children through painting at his studio, Sanggar Bares.

Bratayasa set up Sanggar Bares in 2017. To date, it has listed 50 members comprising children and teenagers. They come from Bali and outside Bali. In principle, Sanggar Bares opens the doors to all youngsters regardless of their backgrounds to study painting without requirements and fees. Among his students are also children with special needs.

He built the studio purely for the purpose of sharing with children. After school, they can spend time sketching here. The equipment is limited to what Bratayasa can afford to provide. In its early period, there were only used paper, crayons, color pencils, markers and water colors.

“I had only those kits, but now several close friends have donated (other equipment). Children are thus more enthusiastically creating artworks,” said Bratayasa in Ubud, Gianyar regency, Bali, on Tuesday (21/4/2020).

I had only those kits, but now several close friends have donated (other equipment).

He claimed to feel happy to watch his students freely engaged in expressing their unrestricted creativity. “I’m pleased to see them enjoy their own and their peers’ works with a high sense of togetherness. Dozens of paintings are appearing daily and worth exhibiting, while they feel proud of their works being put on display,” added Bratayasa.

Sanggar Bares have several times held exhibitions. If some of the pictures displayed are sold, their proceeds are evenly distributed by Bratayasa to studio members. In this way, he wants to instill the significance of togetherness and mutual appreciation in his students. Bratayasa himself takes nothing out of the returns. Making them understand the meaning of togetherness and mutual appreciation already gives Bratayasa overwhelming happiness.

The self-taught painter in fact doesn’t teach his students to produce artworks for the sake of joining exhibitions, becoming champions, let alone earning money. He only wishes to see the children enjoy the process of artistic creation, from the instant they get some ideas to relish their imaginations to the moment they put the ideas on paper sheets or canvases, and appreciate their works. When this is achieved, Bratayasa feels utmost happiness.

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ARSIP I NYOMAN BRATAYASA

Children who are members of Sanggar Bares in Ubud, Bali, are engrossed in painting.

Sharing

The attitude of solidarity and mutual appreciation is now even more noticeable amid the worldwide Covid-19 pandemic, including Bali. Moreover, the pandemic has impacted all sectors, including the “kitchen” resilience of many families.

“I was surprised and didn’t expect that some studio children only consumed instant noodles over the past week (as their families’ economy was hard hit by the pandemic). I couldn’t sleep all night, thinking about this. Finally I decided to tender the children’s paintings in order to raise funds to help studio members facing shortages,” he said in a sad tone.

Owing to the necessity to stay at home during the pandemic, Bratayasa tenders the works of Sanggar Bares children through the Instagram. He hopes he can arouse the interest of people to buy his students’ pictures at prices they are ready to bid. The proceeds resulting from this tender will be fully returned to studio children, particularly to their families now in deep trouble.

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Bratayasa has chosen the tender because he doesn’t want to teach studio members only to wait for the arrival of contributions to help them overcome their difficulties. Under whatever situation, he emphasizes the need for studio children to keep making attempts with their works. Their creations can even be used for charity to help their peers.

Although the studio children’s works are tendered for donations, Bratayasa seriously curates the relevant items. In this manner, he wishes to teach his students to make serious efforts to produce and appreciate their creations.

Every time he prepares an exhibition for his studio members, Bratayasa totally undertakes its arrangement almost alone. He even bears the cost of catalogue publication. He related his experience when he spent over ten million rupiah. He had to bear part of the budget and the other part was derived from aid or close friends’ contributions. Studio children were not burdened with any expense at all.

The same is true when he prepares exhibitions for his own works, which have been held thirty times since 2013. He thoroughly prepares the events by curating the works along with fellow artists and painting collectors.

ARSIP PRIBADI I NYOMAN BRATAYASA

I Nyoman Bratayasa with the children of Sanggar Bares.

Guidance

Bratayasa has no family background of artists. His father, I Made Mudita, is a farmer and his mother, Ni Nyoman Suwitri, a housewife. He has learned painting as an autodidact. He feels he has artistic sensitiveness because his parents have given him freedom of expression since childhood. Besides, the environment where he lives in the zone of Ubud is crowded with painters and art galleries.

With the lapse of time, Bratayasa has grown to be a painter. As an Ubud painter, he also has had bad luck such as when his works were bought but no payments were forthcoming. His bittersweet experiences have prompted him to keep painting and at the same time sharing.

I don’t expect gratitude for everything already done at this studio. It’s growing because they are happy.

His desire to share has been realized among others through Sanggar Bares, which means offering something to those in need. He founded the studio originally because of his concern over the development of cell phone technology, which in his view has deprived children of their sensitiveness to their environment.

He strives to induce children’s sensitiveness through painting art after school. Before finishing school work, they aren’t allowed to visit the studio. Apart from teaching them how to paint, Bratayasa gives or lends fine-art books to be studied by his students. By this method, he positions himself as the students’ guide, instead of dictating them.

With Sanggar Bares now three years old, Bratayasa has even more firmly inculcated the values of honesty, sharing and other noble attitudes through art. “I don’t expect gratitude for everything already done at this studio. It’s growing because they are happy. If only I aimed at earning gratitude and fame, this studio would no longer exist now,” he said.

I Nyoman Bratayasa

Born: Ubud, 16 May 1980

Wife: Ni Putu Desy Kurniasih

Children:

- I Wayan Dendy Permana Putra

- I Made Ananda Krisna Putra

- Ni Komang Aura Komala Dewi

Education:

- State Primary School 6, Lodtunduh Ubud, Gianyar (1989-1994)

- PGRI Junior High School 10, Badung (1994-1996)

- PGRI Senior High School 3, Ubud (1996-1999)

- Warmadewa University, Economic Management (1999-2003)

Activity:

- Founder of Sanggar Bares

- Dozens of solo and joint exhibitions at home and overseas