MONSTER BRAINS

The Ogoh Ogoh Parade
















"Ogoh Ogoh monsters are colourful monster sculptures, which are made from bamboo frames and paper mache.

They are made in the form of creatures of the underworld known in Balinese as buta-kala. The creatures are based on characters taken from traditional myths and legends, however in modern times many also take the form of modern characters, including even people in the media or in the government.

Before the Hindu new year, Nyepi, is celebrated in the spring by a day of silence - you can find Ogoh Ogoh *everywhere* in Bali.

They are mainly built by the youngsters of the villages and kampungs in the weeks and months before Melasti and Nyepi.

On the preceding day, all traffic is blocked and the Ogoh-Ogoh monsters are paraded around near the main intersections and finally burned in the evening to drive away evil spirits.

It’s almost like carnival processions in other countries. The kids can stay up long and carry ‘their’ Ogoh Ogoh around. It’s like a beauty competition on who created the most colourful, funny or scary monster. Of course everyone is proud of their creation and the whole proceedings are very noisy and with plenty of drum sound and screaming and laughing." - quote source with more pictures.

There's a fantastic collection of Ogoh monsters in this gallery, be sure to click through the other Ogoh photo galleries seperated by year at the top.

More pictures of Ogoh sculptures can be seen here.

There's a handful of 360 degree panorama shots of some Ogoh Ogoh beasts here.

And a youtube video of the demon parade...

I'd also like to point out the below two pictures of the remains of one of these strange giant demon sculptures. These gave me a strange idea for a story similar to the Indian tale from Creepshow 2. As monstrous as these things are freshly painted, they're far more disturbing in this ruined state.