Portrait of a woman, undated - pastel

The policy of the Dutch government was to preserve the Balinese culture. But artists like Bonnet and Spies understood that Balinese culture is alive and evolving through the generations. Their idea was to stimulate this evolution by carefully introducing western elements in the tradional techniques.

Bonnet, born in 1895 in Amsterdam, was a quiet boy with a love for drawing. At 21 he became a full-time artist. In 1920 he travelled to Italy with his parents. This open and warm country - as opposed to the cool and cold calvinistic Holland - was an inspiration. He soon returned to Italy to work there and met Nieuwenkamp who advised him to go to Bali. However, Bonnet first crossed the Mediterranean to travel through Northern Africa.

In 1929 he arrived in Bali where he met Spies and Jaap Kunst, a dutch musicologist. With Kunst he travelled to Nias where he made sketches and photographs. In 1930 he move to Bali and settled in Ubud.

He soon became a member of many local organizations and was a respected member of the Balinese society. He was captured by the Japanese in 1942 and imprisoned, like some many other Dutch, in Makasar (Ujung Pandang).
Amongst them was also Willem Hofker, another Dutch painter.

Together with his friend Cokorde Gde Agung Sukawati he founded his life dream in 1954: Puri Lukisan. This museum held part Bonnets' collection.

Due to political troubles, Bonnet was forced to move back to Europe in 1957. His refusal to give one of his paintings to Sukarno was mainly the cause for his extradition. He lived in Italy for a while and finally moved back to Holland in 1963.

Many times his Balinese friends, among which Cokorde Gde Agung Sukawati, tried to get him back to Bali, but only in 1972 he could return to Bali for a few months, to help complete the Puri Lukisan.

He died in 1978. On request by his Balinese friends his ashes were flown back to Bali where he was honoured in a most exceptional way: his ashes were burned together with the body of his friend Cokorde Gde Agung Sukawati in a big traditional Balinese ceremony in 1981.

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