Moldear la danza-drama barong en el Bali paradisiaco: discursos orientalistas de Miguel Covarrubias y sus redes

IIn the 1930s Mexican artist Miguel Covarrubias carried out fieldwork in Bali, an island of the Dutch East Indies. A few years before his arrival, the colonial government had implemented cultural and educational policies, known as “balinization,” meant to preserve Balinese “unique” culture and to ward off external influences like Islam and nationalism. Efforts to Balinize the Balinese by Dutch Orientalist scholar-administrators went hand in hand with creative endeavours of a group of bohemian expatriates to promote Bali and to promote themselves to the world as quintessentially different. Cosmopolitan Covarrubias was at the basis of the romantic image making of “paradise” Bali by dedicating himself to ethnographic recording of a world that might soon be lost. Eager to register “pure” Balinese culture, he actively participated in shaping performing arts. Covarrubias and his networks turned barong dance into a cultural icon.