Letting the (Wood) Chips Fall on the Island of Bali : As natural as breathing, woodcarving as an art is neither intellectual nor aristocratic.

Ten flat wooden fish came home with us from our first trip to Bali six years ago. Each fish is an individual, carved with whimsy and painted with daring. My husband bargained hotly for them and we treasure them well beyond their price, which was somewhat under $5 apiece. I use the fish for place mats, and at least two sets of our dinner guests have decided on Bali as a vacation just so they can go fishing for their own dining room accouterments.

Such carvings are not difficult to find. There are 4,000 woodcarvers on the fabled Indonesian island of Bali. Our fish are modern swimmers in the Balinese tradition of woodcarving that goes back uncounted centuries.

Most of the chips fly in the small village of Mas, flourishing on the fringes of luminous rice fields, 17 miles from Bali’s international airport. The streets of Mas are lined with studios whose wares spill into the seemingly chaotic maelstrom of Balinese daily life.

In their typical openness and generosity, villagers welcome tourists to the festivities. We usually combine a stay in the mountains with some time at one of the coastal resorts.

Some galleries in Mas are air-conditioned, geared for the tour vans. Villagers offer cold drinks to pale, hefty people. But outside in the streets, sculpted items of varying degrees of merit are peddled by children who, if they merely catch your eye, will slyly unfold a piece of cloth and reveal, perhaps, an exquisitely carved bird on a flowering branch. It will be available just to you at a special price, which may be twice the going rate and still a bargain.

Mas is home to master woodcarvers of international reputation. It’s a place where the men who tend the nearby fields practice the woodworking skills that have been handed to them from generations uncounted, for in Bali, almost everyone is an artist. Art is as natural as breath and as common as rice. The uncommon skill and highly developed aesthetic sense of the Balinese people, whether they are indulged princes dwelling in marble pavilions or farmers living in haphazard homes is due primarily to their well-organized, cooperative agricultural system, which allows abundant leisure time. Also, the Balinese never permitted artistic knowledge to become specialized in an intellectual or aristocratic class. The arts are for all. Even for tourists.

At Taman Harum Cottages in Mas, visitors may book bed, breakfast and woodcarving classes. The artistic enclave is like a little village within the village. Guest cottages line flower-bowered lanes, and a communal dining pavilion presides over a lotus pond. There are family temples--even a swimming pool. The interiors of the 17 cottages are in the courtly Balinese style, richly ornamented, plumped with pillows and altogether beguiling.

The cottages were originally built to accommodate artists, mostly Europeans and Australians, who came to study with master woodcarver Nyana. Nyana’s studio, school and his Tantra Gallery are on the premises.

Nyana’s grandfather, Tantra, was a celebrated temple carver. His father was the internationally acclaimed carver Ida Bagus Nyana. And his brother, sculptor Ida Bagus Tilem, spent a year in New York doing commissioned wood sculptures, and now has his own Tilem Gallery in Mas specializing in both contemporary and antique carvings. Nyana himself has won many awards and has had exhibitions as far away as Singapore. His work is shown in galleries throughout Indonesia.

Like many galleries, Nyana’s carries three grades of sculptures. Those made for export are the lowest. Most items of this grade are not even carved at the studio, but bought on the village street. “Most foreigners don’t know quality yet. They like their statues big and cheap,” Nyana said. (Indeed, our own carved banana tree stands chest high and cost $12.)

Nyana’s own work exhibits a lyrical simplicity. “I combine modern ideas with classic Ramayana (the Hindu epic) themes. The idea comes from the wood itself, especially if it’s wood from the roots,” he said of his subject matter. His preferred woods are hibiscus, panggal buaya , commonly called stain wood, and young ebony from Sulawesi.

Nyana, the other master carvers of his studio and their apprentices work side by side outdoors on grass mats in an open pavilion. Sometimes there is gamelan music; always there are songbirds. They work quietly, without conversation, absorbed in the tap-tapping of chisel on wood.

A master woodcarver typically employs about 30 different knives, chisels and gouges, plus a wooden mallet. Unlike Western sculptors who rely on hand pressure, the Balinese artist employs a highly refined technique, which consists of chipping small bits of wood gradually with highly sharpened implements. The touch is delicate and the medium controlled. The statue is usually finished with paint or gilt, or is made smooth with pumice and rubbed with bamboo to obtain a high polish.

Woodcarving is traditionally a man’s craft. Women help with the buffing and polishing, working in a group in their own pavilion.

Originally, all Balinese woodcarving served a purpose. It was richly ornamental and used to adorn beams, lintels and gates of homes and temples, or it was utilitarian, serving as handles for implements or images of household deities. The ornamental genre included elaborate temple carvings depicting the adventures of the densely populated Balinese pantheon, and also elaborate masks used to portray the gods and demons in traditional dance and drama. All works were covered with paint, lacquer or gold leaf. Only the rare piece was left in its raw state.

With the coming of tourism in the 1930s, the artists quickly recognized a new clientele that had little appreciation for the technical perfection demanded by the local populace and actually preferred simplicity of line to intricacy of ornamentation.

The late carver Gusti Gede is credited with pioneering the new school of sculpture, being the first to carve refined images of nude girls bathing, undressing or attending to their toilette. His statues were masterfully executed in fine-grained, highly polished woods.

Today, innovative Balinese carvers aim the majority of their works right at the tourist, producing everything from chopsticks to wooden, flower-shaped cocktail coasters. Calling on the same whimsy with which they formerly carved and painted their dragons, demons, guardians and heroes, they now make and paint wooden banana trees, flowers and picture frames.

A new wrinkle on the woodworking scene is toys. The Balinese are now making bulky wooden trucks, Jeeps and trains, the kind that sell for hundreds of dollars in Europe and America. They can be purchased for about $20 in Bali.

GUIDEBOOK

Woodcarving on Bali

Where to stay: Taman Harum Cottages, Mas, P.O. Box 216, Denpasar 80001, Bali, Indonesia. Contact: Garuda Orient Holidays, 3457 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 205, Los Angeles 90010, (213) 389-4600. Rates: $36-$46, including tax, service and breakfast. The exclusive, expensive Amandari Resort is about four miles away in Ubud, a village known for its painting studios. Rates: $300-$700. Contact: Amandari, Kedewatan, Ubud, Bali, telephone 011-62-361-95333, fax 011-62-361-95335, or The Rafael Group; for reservations: (800) 223-1588. Garuda Orient Holidays has packages that include round-trip air fare from Los Angeles, with five nights and breakfasts at Taman Harum Cottages, plus airport transfers in Bali for $4,148.

Where to shop for wood sculptures: The best strategy is to walk about the village of Mas, visiting the many studios and galleries that line the main street and the back lanes. Bargaining for price is expected in most places. The better galleries include Tantra Gallery at Taman Harum Cottages and Tilem Gallery (telephone locally 35136). Tilem Gallery also has a branch at the Bali Hyatt Hotel, and Tantra has a shop at the Hotel Bali Beach. Shops throughout Bali carry a rich selection of the work of the 4,000 Balinese sculptors at widely differing prices, depending on the quality of the work and the bargaining skills of the buyer. Wooden toys can be purchased at Joger Handicraft Centre, Jalan Raya Kuta (one block from the Tourist Information Office on the corner of Jalan Pantai Kuta), Kuta Beach, Bali; telephone locally 53959.

For more information: Contact the Indonesia Tourist Promotion Office, 3457 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 105, Los Angeles 90010, (213) 387-2078.