Governor Wayan Koster: Bali XLVII Arts Festival Attended By 1.6 Million Visitors

Bali Governor Wayan Koster in Denpasar, Saturday, July 19, 2025 closed the XLVII Bali Arts Party (PKB) with a total record of 1,639,543 visitors who attended from 21 June-19 July 2025. Photo: ANTARA

JAKARTA - Bali Governor Wayan Koster in Denpasar, Saturday, July 19, 2025 closed the XLVII Bali Arts Party (PKB) with a total of 1,639,543 visitors who had been present since July 21, 2025.

"Almost every event that took place in my Cultural Park was present, the audience was always full as it is now full showing the appreciation of the interest of PKB visitors to see various very high stages," said Koster, quoting ANTARA, Sunday, July 20, 2025.

On average, in a day, 56,536 people came to watch the biggest annual art party on the island of Bali.

Until the end of the event, the Bali Provincial Government summarized that there were 517 sekala or art groups participating with a total of 20,089 artists consisting of 78 percent of the younger generation and the rest mature to elderly.

For a month, the festival, which is on the list of superior Karisma Event Nusantara (KEN) Kemenpar, has featured 592 art offerings.

Governor Koster also said that apart from watching the arts, the audience also transacted at 52 local culinary booths and 136 local handicraft booths, so that the presence of visitors had a double effect on economic turnover.

The turnover of selling culinary booths reached IDR 5.1 billion and handicraft booths of IDR 12 billion, so the governor continues to remind the importance of caring for Balinese culture which has been at least part of the source of people's livelihoods.

"Bali is the only province that consistently maintains cultural arts through the PKB event, this strengthens and advances Balinese culture, we need to keep Bali alive, survives, and is competitive," he said.

"This culture has triggered various lives, especially tourism, tourism in Bali, where in 2024 6.4 million people, never get bored with culture, like today many people are visiting," continued Koster.

On the night of the closure, Governor Koster deliberately called the audience representatives, the owner of the handicraft SMEs, and the owner of the culinary booth to share the story.

A spectator named Ketut Rasmini told the governor that he came to the Cultural Park every day to watch a performance at the Bali Arts Festival.

The 83-year-old admitted that he likes to watch dancing the most because he can participate in dancing.

"I like to sing (dancing with dancers) every day I come here from 10 am to night, I'm happy to be healthy, it feels basically like dancing and premonement," he said.

The owner of the culinary MSME Laklak Rama named Gede Yota said that during his 29 days he managed to receive almost Rp. 100 million from selling Balinese snacks.

"Thank you visitors patiently queued and got smoke, this income is enough for salaries, there are 14 employees including the daily staff of school children who are on holiday, we invite them to study here," he said.

Gede Yota said that from his observation for a month there were a pair of foreign visitors who routinely came to the stalls that he used for free from the Bali Provincial Government.

"Thank you, Mr. Gub, native Balinese products can continue to exist, I even saw some tourists 5-6 times the husband and wife of Russian guests came," he said.

The advantage of this year's high visit to the Bali Arts Festival was also felt by I Wayan Karmen, a keben seller or banten container who was able to generate Rp. 161 million for a month.

According to him, with the new system created by the Bali Provincial Government, especially the decranasda in selling people's products to potential buyers, it will help speed up transactions.

"Astungkara until yesterday got Rp161 million, net profit is around 30 percent, this is an independent family business that usually only sells to collectors but this time it passes the PKB curation," said Wayan Karmen.