Bali Echo Magazine Edition 52 | The Wood Carver's Legacy

smooth, hips and breasts gently swelling, smiled suggestively as they invited onlookers to
their dances. In all the carvings, from the largest to the smallest, we saw always the hint of an invitation to join whatever activity the sculptor rendered. The next room was smaller, filled to bursting with fish, frogs, and birds of every size and description, covering every available surface. These carvings were so delicate and realistic, executed with such extraordinary detail, we would not have been surprised to see them leap about, swim, or fly away In this room, our guide constantly encouraged us to pick things up, touch them, turn them in our hands. He wanted us to feel the warmth and weight of the wood.

He wanted us to appreciate the magic of Tilem's genius. We were completely unprepared for the surprise that awaited us in the largest chamber on the upper floor of the gallery. In this room were sculptures that had to be seen to be believed, carvings certain to be coveted by woodcarving connoisseurs and international collectors. Here, a herd of deer, dozens of the little Balinese Kidjang, bounding through the air in graceful arching leaps across a rampaging river. All in teak, the size of a small truck. There, two enormous stallions, rearing in a fight over a mare grazing nearby. The stallions' hair was etched to follow the lines of muscle, tendon, and bone. All in jackfruit wood, larger than life. Given the precision of the etching, l thought the tool of choice was likely to have been a surgeon's scalpel, rather than a chisel or woodcutter's saw.

Just beyond, in the final room we toured, l saw a full-length, life-size carving of a young woman raising her arms, her sarong loosened and falling away, her face an image of ecstasy, As l stood contemplating that graceful hibiscus girl, l was suddenly gripped by a sadness l could not name. Not far away from the lovely dancer we saw two rough blocks of ebony and mahogany sitting in the corner, each lock crudely marked with crayon. The wood blocks still showed traces of the saws and axes that cut them from the

living trees.l asked our guide what these blocks of wood were for, and why they were sitting in the display room. l thought perhaps some wood intended for the workshops was brought by delivery men through the wrong door and inadvertently left behind.

l could not have been more wrong. Our young guide reverently explained these rough blocks were the last pieces of wood Tilem touched with his hands - he was preparing to work with this wood, right before his untimely death. l was not able to tell by looking at the crayon marks what Tilem may have been thinking as he touched, turned, and evaluated those blocks. He saw something nobody else would or could see, and as a gesture of respect, his family and his students maintained that wood in the came state it existed on the day he died. l could now name my sadness. l felt a keen sense of loss, knowing Tilem's bands would never again take up a chisel. Tilem's hands would never again shape a piece of wood into something magical, mythical, or mundane. As l looked at the rough wood blocks, l was reminded that a woodcarver's work should serve as an extension of nature, as a way of enhancing man's communication with the

natural elements of his world. A woodcarver must learn to synthesize his humanity with the natural world in order to achieve true artistic expression. A woodcarver must love the uncarved wood as much as, or maybe even more than, the finished piece. A woodcarver understands there is always the promise of tomorrow in the unfinished wood blocks. This was something Tilem understood. In the Mahabharata, there is a lengthy passage describing Yudishtira's initial encounter with his father, the god Dharma. Yudishtira was dying of thirst as he stumbled across a broad, clear lake. Dharma disguised himself in the form of the lake spirit, and as a test of worth, commanded Yudishtira to answer some questions before slaking his intense thirst. The spirit told Yudishtira he would be struck dead if he tried to drink before answering, or if he answered any of the questions incorrectly. Although parched, his tongue swollen, his lips cracked arid bleeding, Yudishtira managed to correctly answer all of his inquisitor's questions.

miracle of all?" Yudishtira considered the question carefully, then replied, It is this. All over the world, every day, thousands of men's lives end.

And every man in the world awakens in the morning and thinks to himself, today, l will not die." The god, well pleased by his son's answer, revealed himself in his true form, and invited Yudishtira to drink from the lake. Ida Bagus Tilem believed in that greatest miracle, too. He woke every day and worked with the wood, right up until the day he died. The finished carvings remain with us as testimony to his genius. Tilem's own work, and the work of his students, represent the triumph of his will and imagination over the limitations of his body, and the limitations of time. Perhaps the images he was preparing are still inside the wood. One day, perhaps someone whose vision is as clear and whose talent is as great as Tilem's will lay hands on that wood, and the figures will emerge. Those uncut blocks await the loving chisel held by an inspired artist's hand. As we thanked our guide and then stepped out once more onto the sunlit bustle of traffic and pedestrians on JI. Raya Mas, l was thinking about the student woodcarvers sitting quiet and cross-legged in the workshops, shaving, cutting, carving, and dreaming about what was inside the wood they touched. l was thinking about those students, about how their work was truly a celebration of their creativity, and a tribute to Ida Bagus Tilem. In that moment, l understood the woodcarver's true legacyThe final question the disguised god asked of his son was the most important. It was, "Yudishtira, what is the greatest

Marsha L. Browne