Named after the Balinese lunisolar calendar, SAKA Museum is a cultural destination found within the verdant and expansive AYANA Bali, Jimbaran. Set inside a breathtaking building, this one-of-a-kind museum welcomes all who are curious to learn about specific aspects of Balinese culture and traditions with their themed exhibitions and displays.
SAKA Museum stands surrounded by the resort’s tropical gardens, its monumental, avant-garde design an unmissable feat, a vision by Mitsubishi Jisho Design firm. The building takes the shape of a giant compass needle, an ode to the importance of pangider bhuwana, the nine directions of Balinese cosmology. Design certainly sets this destination apart from other museums in Bali, with a sleek, contemporary setting that elevates the visitor experience. The museum has received notable international accolades, including the Kyoto Global Design Award 2024 (Top 100 for Environmental Design), being named one of TIME Magazine’s World’s Greatest Places 2024, and designation by Prix Versailles as one of the World’s Most Beautiful Museums 2025.
Inside, sophisticated exhibitions await, aimed at bringing visitors through a journey of discovery and learning on the museum’s chosen subjects that encompass Balinese history, culture, philosophy and creativity. The interiors – designed by Napp Studio & Architects, a multi-award winning firm known for creating riveting museum journeys – help visitors flow seamlessly through these different exhibition spaces.
SAKA Museum’s Main Exhibitions
KASANGA Exhibition
Visitors are taken through the journey of Nyepi’s (Bali’s Day of Silence) four essential rites. Made in collaboration with art collective, Gurat Institute, the exhibition is an artistic reimagining of this sacred time, where visitors are granted a unique visual and sensory experience of Bali’s ceremonial Saka calendar, after which the museum is named.
“Kasanga, the ninth month in the Balinese calendar, is a time of reckoning,” explains SAKA’s Executive Advisor, Marlowe Bandem. “It marks the peak of cosmic unrest before the arrival of renewal.” The Kasanga rites unfold through Melasti, Tawur Kasanga & Pengerupukan, Nyepi, and Ngembak Geni; these are each explored in new, creative ways through the KASANGA Exhibition.
The purifying tides of Melasti are depicted through copper reliefs inspired by different schools of Balinese painting (Kamasan, Batuan and Ubud), and a floor installation bridges land and water, as if visitors are on the cleansing shores themselves. Tawur Kasanga is experienced through artefacts and archival footage of old rites, showing the rituals of the past. Visitors will experience Nyepi’s four ‘abstinences’ and feel the weight of silence in Zone 3, before experiencing renewal with pieces that symbolise the light of knowledge and new beginnings.
SUBAK: The Ancient Order of Bali
This is a dynamic portrait of Bali’s UNESCO-listed irrigation system known as Subak, which dictates the management of water across the island’s paddy fields and farms. Like the cascading rice terraces, the subak is multi-layered: it refers to a communal philosophy, as well as the physical and societal management of water itself. This is why the system was listed by UNESCO as a ‘manifestation of the Tri Hita Karana Philosophy’ – the relationship between humans, nature and God.
Through multimedia exhibits, films, and captivating hourly light-and-sound shows, visitors engage with the ecological and spiritual elements of Subak, aiming to illuminate the beauty of that wisdom and the community it sustains. The exhibition was curated by Professor dr. J. Stephen Lansing, an anthropologist and author who was the leading force behind the 2012 UNESCO cultural heritage listing.
Panca Maha Bhuta
Enter a treasured gallery that reveals a rare collection of sacred objects and artworks, presented through the Balinese understanding of the five elements: earth, water, fire, air, and ether. This exhibition is about connecting with the unseen forces that have shaped Bali’s rituals and creativity for generations.
Twilight Journey
An immersive dome experience developed by Bali-based multimedia artists Wahyudi Chandra and Raden Cahyoko (Kokok). Using interactive audiovisual technology, the installation evokes the starry skies of Nyepi night, guiding visitors through a meditative visual narrative of Bali’s sacred geography. Twilight Journey was created to evoke both wonder and presence, it’s an invitation to look outward and inward all at once.
Collections & Experiences
Outside of these four main exhibitions guests will also find the SAKA Knowledge Center, featuring historic archives, a vast collection of books on Bali and displays of ancient tika timekeepers and lontar manuscripts; the SAKA Auditorium where series of short films are shown, including the the SAKA-made film on Nyepi; a Palelintangan, a Balinese star calendar, which provides interpretations of one’s star sign (lintang). An art-focused gift shop and museum café are also found within the museum building.
The permanent collection of the museum has been curated by a committee of experts, including Dr James Bennet, Professor I Made Bandem, Farah Wardani, Marlowe Bandem, and art historian Bruce Carpenter. Dr Judith Bosnak is the Director of SAKA Museum.
Open to the public from 10am-6pm.
Entry Tickets IDR 200,000 for adults and IDR 100,000 for children. Tickets are available online.
For Group visits, please email [email protected].
SAKA Museum at AYANA Bali
Jalan Karang Mas Sejahtera, Jimbaran
@sakamuseum
sakamuseum.org
