Balinese Mask Dance from the Perspective of a Master Artist:
I Ketut Kodi on Topeng
Kathy Foley
I Nyoman Sedana
Abstract
I Ketut Kodi is one of the most noted performers of topeng mask dance and wayang puppetry in Bali today. These are two of the most important Balinese arts in that they have exorcistic power needed to complete religious ceremonies. The topeng dancer, like the dalang, is part entertainer, part philosopher, and part exorcist. Kodi teaches at Institute Seni Indonesia (Indonesian Institute of the Arts, formerly STSI) in Denpasar and performs all over the island, often multiple times in a single day. The following interview gives insight into the practice of this important artist who has experienced both the traditional method of training under a village master and the modern method. [End Page 199]
| Figure 1 |
In the early part of this interview Kodi shares ideas on his relationship to his teachers from Singapadu, a village known for performing artists. His ideas reflect village thinking. Kodi avers that the relationship between student and teacher is a permanent bond that is metaphysical as well as rational. Knowledge can be passed by a touch. The spirit of a dead teacher can continue to guide the student from the teacher's family shrine. Such conceptions are part of traditional Balinese performing arts. Likewise, the idea that some knowledge is too "heavy" for the learner and may make him or her ill if studied without appropriate preparation is often encountered. The strength and wisdom of the teacher (dead or alive) becomes a stand-in and protection for the learner until he or she is of age and insight to achieve understanding. Hence, Kodi speaks about parts of the training that he was too young to understand while his teacher still lived, but he believes will come to him later. Likewise, he refers to a number of initiation ceremonies that prepared him to learn and "married" him to his masks. All these features are part of village performance traditions.
He also discusses the role of the mask dancer as entertainer and notes the proliferation of performances that is due to the increased number of ceremonies on the island at present. The balance between teaching and entertaining, he notes, is changing as Balinese society alters. To be successful, mask dancers must respond. In this context he [End Page 200] discusses Sidha Karya, a rather demonic old man mask that topeng dancers do at the end of a performance (see the translation of a Sidha Karya play, which features Kodi, earlier in this issue and the discussion of the mask in the article by Coldiron in this issue). Sidha Karya is needed for the completion of all ceremonies and must be performed at the same time the Balinese priest does his ritual for the ceremony. This requirement has ensured that the topeng dancer has always had regular requests to perform.
During the prosperous times of the last quarter-century many more families have been able to afford full ceremonies. Therefore, priests and topeng dancers, who are both needed to accomplish a ceremony, have full calendars these days, but performances and ceremonies are shorter as dancers and priests rush from place to place to meet the demand. In following I Ketut Kodi for a representative day, Foley attended four mask dance performances: a cremation, an odalan (temple festival), the dedication of a house, and the dedication of a house temple. Kodi's comments give insight into the practice of contemporary Balinese topeng and show that, even as Bali grows more secular, topeng dancers continue to balance entertainment and religious functions.
The interview was conducted in Indonesian at Kodi's office at Institute Seni Indonesia in Denpasar, Indonesia on 9 June 2003. It was transcribed and translated by Foley, who inserted the clarifications of Balinese terms in brackets. Sedana participated in the interview and checked the translation for accuracy.
I Ketut Kodi Interview
FOLEY: How did you become a performer?
KODI: When I was young I was told stories by my grandparents whenever they put me to sleep, and I would already cry with the tales of the people who were poor. So I already understood the nature of narrative. Besides the stories of the raja (kings), they would tell me stories of the shadow puppet theatre, the wayang, since my grandfather was a maker of puppets.
So for example, Twalen and Merdah—which shadow puppet clown was which—I knew. Therefore, I learned stories of both topeng and wayang. Maybe I was drawn to become a penasar, a topeng clown, because of this knowledge I got from my grandfather.
I learned about the art of making topeng masks from my father [I Wayan Tangguh, a noted carver]; each time he would work at the place of his teacher who taught him to carve—Cokoda Raka [End Page 201] Tublen, a maker of masks and sacred Barong [a lion-like mask/ body puppet]—I would follow along. Probably Cokoda Raka Tublen touched my hand and head then. By even being around someone who has knowledge, I am learning, and just being touched on the head is enough. So the seed was already planted.
| Figure 2 |
Maybe it is different for others, but I studied topeng because of the environment around me and because the people of Singapadu are topeng people. Since my father could make masks, I, too, could make masks. But I felt it would be better if my mask making were accompanied by the ability to dance.
My father in the 1960s was a topeng dancer of the clown Kartala. Even though he didn't perform very often, at home he would sing tembang—songs used in topeng. He got his knowledge of Kartala from Pak Sadeg, a Kartala performer from the village of Batuan, so his dance and song were like Pa Sadeg's. I asked Pak Sadeg if my father's tembang was good or not. He said it was and that my tembang was like my father's. He said that if you want to become a topeng dancer you have to have a high voice, a middle voice, a low voice. In his terminology this was mamanyak—maybe that term comes from banyak, which means "many"—it means you can move your voice, here and there, easily. And there was Pa Ketut Rinda, I learned from him, too.
Besides this, I was very interested in history. When I was in grade school studying Balinese history I memorized it all. I knew [End Page 202]all the kings of Bedulu and the eleven ministers. I can still remember it all even now. At that time, I would outshine the other kids, because they were not interested. This memorization [of local historical chronicles], too, pushed me to study topeng.
I studied arja [a contemporary sung drama form] because in my banjar [village community] there was arja for kids, and I played the clown Kartala. Or if there was topeng prembon [a theatre that combines topeng and arja characters], I became the penasar, the clown. I participated in many dance activities: the martial dance of baris, topeng prembon, and topeng panca (five-man topeng), where I played Kartala.
Pak Made Kredek was my teacher, and under his direction I read lontar [palm leaf manuscripts] about the history of Bali and Bangli. I also got the theory of wayang puppetry from Pak Kredek and studied wayang stories from him. So it was in 1975–1976 that I became a penasar, clown, under the teaching of Pak Made Kredek. It was as if he wanted to pass down as much of his knowledge as possible to me because he already knew he was going to die. I didn't know he was dying. . . . I was away [when he became sick]. I didn't know that he was gravely ill.
But, although he is dead now, my relationship of studying with him continues to the present. He told me when he died to burn a blank lontar manuscript. So after the ngasti [the second ceremony after the cremation which returns the purified spirit to reside in the family shrine], I burnt a blank lontar. The ngasti ceremony means that Pa Made Kredek returned to the family shrine, coming home to be worshipped by his descendants. Therefore, even though he is dead, he is there in the shrine, the sangah kamulan.
I already had done an initiation ceremony [mawinten] in a general manner, called mawinten of the goddess of learning Saraswati, because in 1978 I became very sick. For the ceremony of mawinten Saraswati, you have to be purified. I tried reading the lontar Saraswati from Saba Palace, with my friend Agung Serama Semadi. I just read a few pages and my head started hurting. I didn't keep reading, because the thought came to me that I was still too young. Pak Kredek was already dead then, and he had told me, later when he was dead, there was a book with pictures painted by my father there [in the Saba palace]. But I haven't tried to read these books again yet; perhaps later, when I am fifty.
It was when I was seventeen, after I had already started to dance and had the costume, that I underwent the ceremony. This was both an upacara [ceremony] and upakara [celebration] to make you one with the topeng—to marry you to the masks. But, because [End Page 203] my teacher, Made Kredek, was already dead, the one who did the ceremony was another teacher and friend.
FOLEY: And can you talk about your formal education?
KODI: I began to dance topeng in 1978 and I became a dalang, narrator of a sendratari (dance-drama) called Japatuan [a story telling how Japatuan searches for his dead wife Ratnayu in heaven]. That year when there was a ceremony of the karya madana at the village temple of Singapadu. I was just graduating from middle school, and it was on TV. Then Nyoman Sedana (who was then a student at the High School of Performing Arts [SMKI/KOKAR]) sought me out, saying: "This one should go to school at KOKAR. This one is a dalang." It was all a result of my education from Pak Kredek.
I got the theory of wayang from Pak Kredek. But I started actually performing wayang when I was at school at SMKI in 1979, and continued when at ASTI [Indonesian Dance Academy] in 1983, and I kept on at ASTI when it changed its name STSI [Indonesian State College of Arts] in 1988.
I studied at school with puppet master Pak Rajeg [see deBoer 1979] and his son Pak Sumandhi [former head of SMKI/KOKAR], Pak Wija [the top puppet performer of the 1980–1990s], Pak Mawa, Pak Dewa Sayang, Ida Bagus Sarga, and Pak Persib. And outside of school I studied with the puppeteers of Sukawati: Pak Wayan Nartha and Pak Ganjareng. I continued studying outside school with Pak Sidja of Bona, Gianyar, who is a student of Pak Rindha.
Your teachers give you things. I got a book from Pak Rajeg: he told me to come to the house and he gave me a book right before he died. I have some books in Balinese script that I got from Pak Sidja. And, to the present, if I am playing in Pak Sidja's area, I will stop to visit him and he will hug me [transferring knowledge]. Meanwhile, I studied practical things at the school, how to manipulate the wayang puppets, how to hit the cempala [the wooden knocker used for cues and sound effects].
Then, with Pak Nartha, I did the sendratari [dance-drama] Rajapala and then other dance-dramas: Gatotkaca Saraya, Ramayana, and Sang Kaca with my friend Dalang Ketut Suweca. I would prepare myself to present the dalang narration in the dance-drama by studying the music and knowing the dance. I lost a lot of sleep practicing. When I took a bath, I would always be singing and doing the voices of the characters represented by the dancers. In the afternoon I would come home from school. Behind my house there is a tree where I would put my chair. I would sleep there, practice tembang singing, and develop the dialogue of the wayang, the topeng, and the dalang sendratari. I was like a crazy person, practicing [End Page 204] hour after hour. To the present I still do it. If I am in the bathroom, I am practicing!
I became a dalang of wayang kulit in 1981 and I learned how to play the gender [keyed bronze percussion instrument used for musical accompaniment of wayang] that same year. I have done many kinds of performance. I did calonarang [dance-drama using consecrated masks in which the widow-witch, Calonarang, is usually defeated by the lion-like Barong] a couple of years ago at Batubulan. I was so convincing as the witch that people said I was studying sorcery because I was such a good leyak [witch]! But, of course, I was just reading up on it for the performance.
The arts I like best are dancing in topeng and playing the wayang. They are arts you can mold to your own interests. Topeng is like a container for ideas. To do topeng, you have to be good at dance, at dialogue, at singing, read a lot of philosophy, and know social life. My strengths are the singing and narration. As for the dancing, I'm not as good at the dancing as Djimat [I Made Djimat, a major topeng performer of the present].
I read many kakawin [old Javanese poetic narratives] and geguritan [middle Javanese poetic narratives]. After all, knowledge isn't in a single book! For topeng I transform the kekawin into tembang [middle Javanese poetic] form. You really need to know all the literature to be knowledgeable in Bali. For example, if you are doing Mahabharata, the epic of the Pandawa heroes, you really need to know Ramayana, the story of King Rama, because that story chronologically precedes the Mahabharata. Topeng's Balinese history is later than both of them.
FOLEY: What relationships do you see between topeng and wayang?
KODI: For me the rhetoric of topeng and wayang is really the same. You have clown servants [panakawan] in both, the old man figure in both, and the king. The voices are the same. For example, the stomach voice in wayang is used for the character Dukuh in topeng. The voices of Kartala (the clown in topeng) and Delem (the clown-servant of the antagonist in wayang) are the same voice. So, for both arts, the technique is the same. The medium is different—one uses masks, the other puppets. The sources are a bit different—kekawin is the source for tandak and bebaturan [narrative songs which accent the action] for wayang, while for topeng you take songs from geguritan [Balinese poetic narratives] and kidung [middle Javanese poetic narratives] such as Tantri, which tells animal fables; Malat, which tells stories about the Javanese hero Panji; and especially Kidung Lawe, if you are, like me, from the Gianyar area. I think maybe the reason that so much of the tembang song of topeng comes from [End Page 205] Kidung Lawe is that these stories of the Javanese kingdom of Majapahit are the original source of topeng. [Balinese mask dance presents stories of Balinese history and is derived from the mask dance tradition of Java imported to the island at the fall of the Majapahit dynasty in the sixteenth century.]
SEDANA: Can you talk about the relationship of stories in wayang and topeng?
KODI: In terms of stories of wayang and topeng, some of the ones I like are [wayang's] Durga Lalana [Durga's meditation] and [topeng's] Watu Renggong [about the king of the same name]. Durga Lalana is good because it is about the birth of wayang, topeng and the other arts. It goes like this.
Despite the efforts of the king and the ministers, there are many people who are dying, many who are ill. So Sanghyang Trisamaya [a god composed of the three main gods of the Hindu pantheon: Bhrama, Wisnu, and Iswara/Siwa] descends into the world. He creates a sanggar, a performance group. Then all the ministers are instructed by Sanghyang Trisamaya to do a ceremony that must be accompanied by a pandita [priest] named Sidhayoga. This is a symbol of the power of performing arts in their ability to pacify bhutakala, the demonic.
And then there is the story of Watu Renggong, the king of Gegel, who is having a ceremony, a yadnya. He invites the father priest from abroad to come to the ceremony, but instead the priest's son, Danghyang Astapaka, turns up. Watu Renggong and the people don't trust this priest's capability. Danghyang Astapaka realizes that the king and the people are going to test him. Having hidden a goose in a well, the king and people ask, "Can you recognize this sound?" Astapaka says it is the sound of a naga, a dragon, and the people laugh at him. When he says it is the voice of a naga they think, "This is a stupid pandita who knows nothing."
But that is not the case. They look in the well and the goose has been transformed into a naga. Then Astapaka leaves Gegel and goes to Banjar Ambengan in Singaraja, North Bali. I made a variation in the story here. I made the king of Gegel regret his actions. Thus, Watu Renggong apologizes to Astapaka, but Astapaka says, "No you were right. As a king you should test everyone coming to Bali. If you don't, you are not a careful man."
That's how it is for leaders in Bali, now. If new people come to Bali they should be examined. Not all of them are coming to make Bali better. What is more, now [after the 2002 bombing in Kuta] there is already proof! [End Page 206]
Danghyang Astapaka asks the help of the king to build a fortress on the south coast. He says, "I was working at the beach and found a very special place to build a guard post." So that is why the island of Bali is protected by temples in every part and the temples themselves form a fence of sorts around Bali's perimeter, so the garden inside the fence will be secure. Thus, Danghyang Astapaka and the king of Gegel become friends and respect one another. Neither is higher; they both speak "up" in language level to each other. [In Balinese one shows respect by using vocabulary that indicates the person spoken to is higher in status than the speaker.] The king is advised by Astapaka and Danghyang Nirata [another priest who established Balinese Hinduism]. This story is about the golden age of Bali. I usually use this story [about how the spiritual and political have to work together] when my audience is bupati [regents] or government officials. If I am planning to do another story and a mayor turns up, I change the story. I use the opportunity to instruct.
FOLEY: How do viewers now compare with viewers from before?
KODI: In the past people liked to hear more philosophy. In 1975 it was only 50 percent humor, but now the humor is 75 percent and the philosophy only 25 percent, or sometimes it is all just joking. But it is our duty as artists to be teachers, to teach religion. I like to play the clown Kartala, bondres [comic masks which can be invented by each dancer], and the Pandita [priest] because they have humor, but there is teaching inside what they say. If philosophy doesn't hit the mark, maybe the humor will. You can't hunt with a single weapon: if one doesn't work you have to have another. So what I do is 50 percent humor and 50 percent philosophy.
I have a duty as a guru. The artist is a guru. They say that in the past my master I Made Kredek had more teaching in his performance than I, but they say I am gifted in doing teaching through the humor. My audience is expecting humor, philosophy, and political criticism. They are waiting to see who will be hit. You have to be good at bringing up what is going on with the people nowadays.
For example, I will have a character talk about his confusion about which ceremony to attend when he is asked to come to both a cremation and a dewa yadnya [ceremony for the gods] at the same time. I'll have the Pandita character say, "I couldn't sleep thinking about this, should I go to the cremation or the ceremony for the gods [dewa yadnya]? Finally I got the answer. Don't go to the cremation, and don't go to the dewa yadnya! Just stay home and [End Page 207] sleep! At the cremation they will think I am at the dewa yadnya and at the dewa yadnya they will think I am at the cremation!"
So the viewers say "Ah!" and really laugh. You see this is really a hot issue. Priests today have so many ceremonies they are asked to do that they can't fulfill all the requests, and it's the same with topeng dancers. Seriously, I do have a hard time showing up, because my calendar is full.
You have to know what is current and you can't just be negative. You have to give explanation. Take 25 percent negative and wrap it in 50 percent positive. Topeng has to fit the ceremony. The artist has to keep his eyes and ears open to what is being talked about. Sometimes what you encounter in a place will be successful as opposed to something you carry there, made up in advance and memorized. What one sees in the place, what one hears will be successful. You have to link events happening right now with your stories.
For example, yesterday there was a ceremony for a house, but in fact the land had been inhabited for ten years! That is not the way it should be. Ten years is called taulan [corpse]. Because that was the situation, I made a story that pertained. They watched—the son and father were watching intently absorbed—because I took material from the Asata Kosala Kosali [Book of the Builder] and wariga calendar [the wariga includes thirty seven-day-weeks of the pawukon, 210 day cycle, from Sinta though Watugunung. (See Eiseman 1990: 172–192)].
I said, "You aren't allowed to make a permanent home first, but must make a simple structure to test the appropriateness of the land, whether it is livable for humans or not. First, you make a simple house with pillars of living trees. If the trees live it means that people can live there, but if the trees die the people will sicken and die." So everything I performed was about the rules for building a house, because the ceremony had to do with consecrating a house.
Another change from the past is that there are more ceremonies. Before, the economy of Bali wasn't good. Even to eat was difficult. But now the economy is better and everywhere people are capable of having ceremonies. So, this has changed things for priests: if before they did two ceremonies a day, now it may be ten or fifteen. I have even heard of thirty times in a day. So ceremonies that used to take one hour now are thirty minutes. Now, instead of pausing between mantra it's all one-two-three, done!
So I have to finish my performance, which used to take an hour, in thirty minutes. You have to be clever in how you are going to use that thirty minutes so everything fits—dance, teaching, clowning, [End Page 208] and Sidha Karya [the ritual blessing that concludes all ceremonial topeng performances]—it all has to be finished. Before the [the opening] dance was longer. There were three [or four] masks thatwould come out: topeng keras manis [strong male], topeng gila [crazy], topeng tua [old man], but now you just do two, but it really must be three. Topeng manis is birth, topeng buduh [gila] is life, and topeng tua is death.
The first is serious; the second is searching, to the right, to the left. Then you get to the topeng tua: he is refined, serious, and studying how to do the right thing in the world. After that, we start the cycle again. These topeng are symbols of utpeti, setiti, and pralina—birth, life, and death.
And inside of life, setiti, you get the drama. Drama talks about living: the relation of the king and the minister, the minister and the people, the king and the priest, humans and god. It's about how we must act protecting harmonious life (hita). It's about our relationship with parents, with people, with the social context. So what is developed in the story has to do with guarding hita, guarding life.
FOLEY: Can you speak about taksu, the spiritually generated energy that makes for a talented performer?
KODI: What can I say about taksu? That is something I can't explain. Whoever tries to explain it doesn't hit the mark. I can give you examples of artists with taksu: Dalang Granyam, Madra, and Wija [famous puppet masters of the twentieth century from Sukawati], and from topeng Pak Griya, and, in the present generation, Pa Carangsari, and some say me. I see each of these artists has a different kind of process, some don't really know the literature.
Take for example how the clown Dadab, the stupid character, is presented. He used to be an illiterate. But the Dadab of the present is different from the Dadap of the past. Nowadays he can already speak English and read the paper. Before he would not have known about different religions and tourism.
But the past was still a time of greater taksu than the present. The artist who has taksu is one who can wed the microcosm and the macrocosm, the buana alit and the buana agung. An artist cannot just sit at home, wake, sleep and then perform in the evening. If he does that he won't be able to reflect the social situation of the living. He has to know the buana agung. Maybe in the past you would hear of an artist who was involved in cockfights, because there he would hear what was going on in the social life. Sometimes he would sit at the warung [food stall], drinking and listening to the voices of people. He would associate with farmers, with gamblers, [End Page 209] with thieves and rogues. He has to befriend the whole world. So in my thinking the artist has to wed the microcosm and the macrocosm. This includes sastra [literature] and ilmu [esoteric knowledge], but these have to be inside. He has to know what is happening outside the house walls. He has to know the life of the farmers and the sellers.
If an artist is going to be a major artist he has to leave himself, he has to be willing to go out there—like a Kathy Foley traveling to Bali, to Sunda, Sumatra, East Java [the interviewer was doing research in these areas of Indonesia]. There are different ways to do this. You can do it by going fishing or you can to it by going to the market.
In some sense the market is the buana agung, the macrocosm. There are all kinds of people there, many that you can later include in a performance! You see the handsome and beautiful people, their way of speaking. As an artist, you can't just do yoga and communicate with god, keeping in your own little slot. You have to go to the river, go to the market, go to the rice fields. You have to hang out with the merchants, the farmers, the politicians—and don't leave out the drunks! What is in the mind of the drunkard, we have to know that too, though we won't ourselves become the drunkard.
FOLEY: Sidha Karya is a story about a priest who comes to help with a ceremony and, being rejected, curses a kingdom, unleashing many ills until the king finds him and apologizes. What does this story represent and why is this figure that must dance to complete a ceremony demonic looking?
KODI: The form [of Sidha Karya] is frightening because he is a symbol of scaring and chasing. [See the translation in this issue.] The story is about Sidha Karya, also known as Brahmana Keling or Brahmana Sangkya, and there is a lontar, which suggests that he is a Brahman from the linage of Kayu Manis of Madura. The story takes place when Raja Watu Renggong has a buta yadnya, a ceremony to appease the demonic forces. Sidha Karya is called to participate in the ceremony because Watu Renggong's father [Dalem Ketut Nguleser, also known as Sanghyang Semara Kapaksian] is a good friend of Sidha Karya's father.
In my presentation of this story, I have borrowed some ideas from a Mahabharata episode in the Adi Parwa part of that epic. There is an incident where a yadnya sarpa, a ceremony to appease the snakes, takes place, but it is unsuccessful in just the same way that Watu Renggong's ceremony to appease the demons is unsuccessful. In the Mahabharata story a dog, Romo Arsana, is not treated [End Page 210] well, and therefore the whole ceremony fails, because for a ceremony to be successful, everyone must be treated well.
| Figure 3 |
If a ceremony fails when just a dog is not treated well, how much more so when it is a human being! Sidha Karya is the son of the priest who presided at the installation of Watu Renggong's father as king. He is a brother [owing to this ritual connection]. He is family. He is not treated well, when even a dog should be treated properly.
Watu Renggong thinks people with dirty clothes are not valuable. He thinks, "Oh, they are stupid and filthy. They will hinder the ceremony!" That's wrong. This is an evaluation that is sociocultural, not natural. So what, if some people bring gifts to the ceremony and Sidha Karya doesn't? Just using money, carrying a gift—that won't make the ceremony complete! It is by incorporating everybody, incorporating everything.
In the offerings for the Sidha Karya blessing, it is inclusiveness that is important. There must be the five kinds of wood, the four kinds of rice, and so on. You have the black rice, the red rice, the white rice, the yellow rice. The manca warna [five-colored] is made up of mixing the first four. It represents the center or everything [End Page 211] altogether. [The different colors of rice represent the four directions and the multicolored is the center, symbolizing the whole cosmos that is blessed and unified by the Sidha Karya performer at the end of his dance.]
Whoever appears has a contribution, regardless of race or caste. This is what is important in developing society. We should give everyone a certificate of appreciation, just like the national award, the Wijayakusuma. Everyone who participates in the ceremony, no matter how small the contribution, should get a certificate! You add a bit and a bit and a bit. Combined, it becomes a lot. It becomes perfection.
This is what it is like when you do a topeng performance. Somebody dances the topeng, somebody does the offering, somebody does the music—everyone is participating. That's what perfection is. Everyone has a role. We combine to make things perfect. This is a paradigm that political leaders should follow, publicly acknowledging the contributions of all, just like the king used to give titles to dalang in Java—let everything be stated publicly. This is our old custom, our local custom, and current rulers—giving credit where the credit is due—should continue this.
FOLEY: Why is this exorcistic story required for the completion of ceremonies?
KODI: The intent of the Sidha Karya ceremony is to chase the demons, bhutakala, for a time. The ceremony is a symbol of their temporary expulsion in a positive way [somia], giving them an offering and coins. It's like Pak Sidja, my teacher, he calls the little kids to him, gives them money and sends them away. He's chasing them, but in a way that is nice and polite. The frightening face of Sidha Karya is a symbol of the chasing away and the giving of money is chasing in a polite manner. So they [the demons] are gone, but as soon as the ceremony is over the bhuta are back. Outside the house, there are bhuta. If the ceremony didn't happen, they would be even more powerful. The bhuta are strong. But, if the ceremony is powerful, they don't have strength over you any more. They are empty, cold.
It is about our connection with God. It is not strength that is needed, but calmness. We chase and give payment called caru [offering for a demon] for a bhuta yadnya [ceremony for demons]. So there is this idea that masks that are scary looking [like the Sidha Karya mask] can chase in a way that is nice and polite.
Ogoh-ogoh [are large figures representing demonic powers]: they don't really chase, but they exorcise and avert the danger in apolite way. Ogoh-ogoh resemble the demonic bhutakala in form. [End Page 212] Everyone adores the demon figures and shows love and affection toward them, but the purpose is to chase them away. They go, but always return again. Because that's what life is: death itself is just a recycling. No one dies, even though there is death. You don't actually die; there is life after death. You live, but your nature is transformed. So, even if there is death, it is only part of the cycle.
SEDANA: It is not death, but a journey.
I Ketut Kodi is one of the most important performers of Balinese topeng (mask) dance. In this interview he shares insight into his education as a performer and his obligations as a mask dancer in contemporary Bali.
Kathy Foley is a professor of theatre arts at University of California–Santa Cruz and editor of Asian Theatre Journal.
I Nyoman Sedana is head of the Padalangan (puppetry) Department at ISI, formerly STSI-Denpasar. He completed an MA at Brown University and a PhD at the University of Georgia. His articles have appeared in Asian Theatre Journal, Asian Music, and Puppetry International. He frequently dances and presents Balinese puppetry in Bali and internationally.
Support for this work was provided by AMINEF-Indonesia via a Fulbright Senior Research Scholar Grant and by the UCSC Committee on Research and Arts Research Institute.
References
DeBoer, Fredrik. 1979.
"Pak Rajeg's Life in Art," The Drama Review 23(2): 57–62
Eiseman, Fred B., Jr. 1990.
Bali: Sekala and Niskala. Vol 1. Jakarta: Periplus.
No comments:
Post a Comment