Like other Bandungeducated Indonesian artists, Nyoman Tusan evolved under his influence a cubist style that took with the years an increasingly abstract look. His works, however, remained "Balinese": their shape and color looking paintings usually allude from that of symbols and offerings from the island religious tradition. He is known in particular for his paintings of the Cili, a symbol of the rice goddess.

A second wave of modern Balinese artists appeared in the late 60s and early 70s. All were educated in Yogyakarta at the ASRI School of Art. This school, unlike the Bandung Institute, was Indonesian-run. Rather than emphasizing formal research in form and color, it dwelt instead on the wealth of symbols of Indonesia's many cultures. This was particularly suited to the Balinese painters' taste and talent.

The first of Yogyakarta's educated painter is Nyoman Gunarsa (58). Nyoman Gunarsa combines with taste Balinese subjects with the "expressionistic" manner of modern art. Even though he avoids narrative topics, he still relies on figures that can immediately be identified as exotically Balinese: dancers and characters from puppet theater (wayang). In this way he clearly displays his Balinese 'identity.' On the formal side he uses warm colors in a free, informal manner as to just suggest from a few synthetic color lines the lyrical movements of a dance or puppet. He thus demonstrates himself as 'modern' too. This attractive blending of tradition and modernity is the key to the artist success here and abroad, particularly in the United States.