The shadow-puppet theatre. The puppets represent animals,
demonic beings, mythical figures, human beings of all social strata, heavenly
beings and scenic props or figures. In a Wayang Kulit performance, a dalang
puppet master silhouettes these flat, cut-out figures against a translucent,
white screen with an oil lamp as a single source of light. While Wayang theatre
has a fixed structure and dramatic characters, its performance invariably
involves the creativity and improvisation of the dalang. He (although the
dalang can be male or female, for ease of convention the dalang is referred to
as ‘he’ throughout this book) is the creator and central focus of the Wayang
performance, because he unites the role of dramatist and performer. The dalang
has been responsible for passing down
culture and tradition from one generation
to another. He is also an interpreter of philosophy and religion and an
accomplished actor responsible for the detailed vocal characterisation of each
puppet. In addition, he demonstrates complex musical skills in his interaction
with the live gamelan orchestra that always accompanies a performance. He
frequently drums with one foot, against a wooden box, as percussive punctuation
to the performance and as a system for cueing the orchestra. So, he is
simultaneously solo performer, adaptor, director, puppeteer, musician and
musical director. Sometimes, when a performance has a ritual purpose in certain
temple ceremonies, he also functions as priest.
Broadly speaking, Asian theatre forms are presented in
the West as strictly codified. Many tend to believe that stylisation equals
repetitive reproduction in performance of a series of gestures and musical
sequences learned by rote; the subjects of creativity and improvisation in this
art are unfortunately overlooked. Wayang Kulit is a good case study of how a
performer blends detailed personal interpretation within a complex structure of
rules and traditions.
 |
| Behind the Wayang Kulit screen |
This creative element is known as kawi dalang, which
means the creativity (kawi) of the puppet master (dalang). The kawi dalang is
not only crucial in perpetuating the genre, but it also allows each production
to be distinct and unique, even though the dalang may perform the same story over
and over again. Kawi dalang demands that each performance changes in accordance
with the fluctuating place–time–circumstances, desa–kala– patra, so in fact
every performance is in some ways unique. Thus, kawi dalang is a term in the
Balinese traditional theatre that solely deals with the dalang’s creativity and
improvisation in his performance. Kawi refers to two different things: an
action of aesthetic creation and the name of a language. With reference to the
action of aesthetic creation, it means creation, improvisation, invention, or
modification. One who composes a play is called pangawi, meaning creator or
composer or poet. This term is composed of the prefix pa, a tool or an agent,
added to the root word kawi, creation. Kawi also refers to the old
Javanese-based language that court poets (pangawi) traditionally used and
developed. They translated and transformed the Sanskrit source version of the
Indian epics Ramayana and Mahabharata into the new Javanese version known as
kakawin, which is the plural form of Kawi. This is all important as it
indicates another layer of complexity in the world of a dalang – he has to
juggle linguistic problems as he decides when to use Sanskrit (the source
language of the two key epic stories, Mahabharata and the Ramayana, on which
all performances are based) and when to use Kawi or the vernacular. Neither
Sanskrit nor the Kawi language are much understood by the majority of
audiences, so most of the language is spoken in the vernacular with some
sections of Kawi interlaced. Kawi, for example, is much further removed from
everyday speech in Bali than Shakespearian English is for a contemporary
audience in England or the USA. In the context of kawi dalang, however, Kawi is
not primarily used as the name of a language, but rather refers to the created
arts and improvisations of a dalang. According to the ancient sacred treatise,
Darma Pawayangan, the dalang is entitled to say anything that can be said
(Hooykaas, 1973: 18–19), including making a new interpretation of any established
name or term. In effect, this means that he is free to change and adapt the
stories as he wishes and in Bali one may see radically different presentations
of the same source material.
Historians suggest that the performance of Wayang
theatre represents the peak of development of shamanism. Expanding the
traditional role of the shaman, the dalang serves as an artist and a priest to
create a Wayang performance and bless holy water. Employing a white screen and
an oil lamp to cast the shadows of the Wayang puppets from inside a booth, the
dalang performs his various roles to the accompaniment of gamelan music.
Based on the two Indian epics or other domestic
narrative repertoires, the dramatic characters are presented by about 125
carved flat leather puppets with highly stylistic form and colour. These
figures were and are created through a wide range of spiritual experiences or
meditations. Since, to the Balinese mind, spiritual experience is holistic and
the ultimate experience a human being can have, its expression and explanation
can only be visualised through symbols. Symbols developed worldwide in every
stage of human history and various forms of cultural arts record their
formulations; the oldest known Balinese theatre that elucidates and records
those symbols is Wayang. In addition to what the casual outside observer might
see in the form of narration, character and plot, there is a highly complex
exhibition of symbols at work, linking the performance, for both the Balinese
spectators and the performers, to a spiritual context.
The performance may be completely sacred, without
needing human audiences, as seen in the daytime performance of the Wayang
Lemah, or entirely secular, as seen in several tourist performances. However,
the majority are ceremonial, which are held for numerous religious and ritual
celebrations such as temple anniversaries, rites of passage and numerous
holidays. Coming to a performance of Wayang, the audience is not required to
pay an admission fee, but is expected (apart from within a touris tcontext) to
wear the traditional Balinese temple dress. Several kinds of local
entertainments and enterprises, such as gambling events and food stalls,
temporarily spring up outside a temple and around the performance site to cater
for the taste of upwards of 300 or 400 people; most performances are social
gatherings on a large scale. While a performance is in progress, the audience
may smoke, drink, eat, chat, in addition to responding or reacting to the
performance itself; a few children may be playing around the edges of the
performance area or even sleeping until their favourite comic and fighting
scenes commence; dogs may be barking and fighting for discarded food in the
near vicinity. However, in spite of such distractions, at most performances the
dalang is trained to concentrate totally on the performance and uses many theatrical
devices to control audience concentration. This ability to concentrate
intensely in the midst of apparent noise and chaos is a strong characteristic
of Balinese performers in various forms. Often during special temple festivals,
simultaneous or overlapping performances of dance, masked dance and shadow
puppets occur in the same temple area. Orchestras play different music at the
same time and seem to have no problems concentrating. Villagers watch one
particular performance or change to another at will. It is also extraordinary
to the Western observer that small children exhibit an intense ability to
concentrate as members of an audience at a performance that lasts many hours.
It is interesting that the audience experience is entirely different when watching
the two types of shadowpuppet performance. During the daytime performance, the
audience gives little attention to the narrative and technique as the
performance is intended to increase the sense of ritual as a means of assisting
devotion. However, the night-time performances, although often related to
temple events, are designed to provoke a noisy and active audience response as
the narrative, humour and extravagant demonstration of technique hopes to
receive a lively response. In contrast, tourists find night-time shadow
performances difficult to enjoy, largely because of the length and problems of
language. The topical humour is lost and the techniques are not understood or
well recognised.
Unlike in most Western traditions of performance, the
events in a temple ceremony/festival are for the primary benefit of the gods
and not humans. Humans are welcome to enjoy the performance, but their presence
is incidental. This is essential in considering why such an ancient form of
performance has such durability. Numerous performance forms are dying out and
completely disappearing at a phenomenal rate across Asia, especially since the
advent of the electronic age. European soccer matches are broadcast to small
towns and villages in the region and American movies are standard viewing.
Local television soap operas, video games and pop videos combine in an assault
against traditional performance forms. The economics of modern-day existence in
the region conflict with long training periods for performance, often of many
years duration; the need to earn a living forces people to migrate to cities
and abandon family and/or village performance heritage. In Bali, however, a
longevity to performance forms exists that defies much of this regional trend;
this is largely because of the almost complete entwining of performance with
religious devotion and ceremony. Wayang is a prime example of a form that, in
its very essence as an archaic, moving picture projection, should have
logically been long eclipsed by electronic media. However, it is still current
and popular when performed at ceremonies, private and public, within and
outside the temple, continually throughout Bali. It is mandatory for certain
events and often chosen when optional at others. In fact, unlike some Balinese
forms of performance, such as Legong, Wayang has not largely been perpetuated
by tourist performances. On the whole, it is a form that appeals almost
exclusively to the Balinese communities within their village environment. It is
the ceremonial and religious function that drives the continuance of the form.
No comments:
Post a Comment