Timorese Warrior

I bought this warrior-themed canvas at Tais Market in Dili, East Timor. “Tais” is a kind of homemade cloth, and there was only one place in the whole market with artwork on the cloth. Timorese people, naturally, buy tais cloths for all purposes, and every color combination means something. The person who sold me this piece of art said that the artist had gone to South Korea for work. The artist’s last name, Gomes, is about as rare in Timor as “Kim” is in South Korea, but I still decided to track him down; I had his phone number at least. A warrior is depicted on the cloth wearing his parade uniform; people still wear this uniform at festivals. I managed to find the artist and I messaged him on WhatsApp. He told me that for this artwork he drew his own father, dressed in traditional East Timor warrior garb. He drew his father before setting off for Seoul because he knew he would miss him. Now this portrait of his father is in Ukraine!

And before this purchase, I almost bought a painting of a Timorese woman. Read that interesting story here.

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