The painting, Das Karussell, was painted by Walter Spies five years before he moved to Bali in 1927. In contrast to the paintings of Bali’s natural environment htat he would later become known for, this painting shows a busy scene at a fair with a carousel as its focus. The painting has several odd qualities: from the distorted perspective as well as the disproportionate representation of figures. It is reminiscent of the approach used by expressionist painters of the time – such as Marc Chagall and Henri Rousseau.

This painting is representative of Walter Spies’s student work in Dresden, Germany. He also learnt from Oskar Kokoschka in Hellerau. Apart form this, he also worked with the Secession art group in Dresden and was inspired by Otto Dix. Walter Spies’s artistic career was promising and he was involved in numerous exhibitions in Germany and the Netherlands. The painting, Das Karussell, was first shown at one such exhibition.

The image of the carousel also appeared in his painting titled, Laterna Magica (1926). At the time, he was already based in Yogyakarta. The colours used in this painting repeated the dark colours of Das Karussell, and indicated his transition from a European style of painting with new subjects found in Java.

 

About the Artist

Walter Spies was a German artist who spent the last years of his life in Indonesia. After he left Moscow, where he was born, he sailed to the Dutch East Indies after he had been made curious by various Dutch postcards. Firstly he lived in Bandung and then moved to Yogyakarta where he worked for the Sultan, before moving to Ubud in Bali in 1927. He recorded and collected many aspects of Balinese arts, which he then preserved in the museum which he founded, the Bali Museum.

In 1936, he was one of the founders of Pita Maha, an arts organisation. Together with Wayan Limbak, he developed the Sang Hyang dance and the Ramayana epic to become what we now know as the Tari Kecak (Monkey Dance).