follow instructions and write 2 paper

My Bodies: The Performer in West Java Author(s): Kathy Foley Source: TDR (1988-), Vol. 34, No. 2 (Summer, 1990), pp. 62-80 Published by: The MIT Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1146027 . Accessed: 11/11/2014 13:44

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

The MIT Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to TDR (1988-).

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies

The Performer in West Java

Kathy Foley

"The soul changes its abode, the soul changes its abode, changes its garments," sings the dalang (puppetmaster) of the wayang golek, the Sun- danese puppet theatre of West Java, Indonesia. While chanting, the per- former replaces one puppet with another; a refined lady becomes a dynamic warrior; a fanged ogre sports the svelte body of Arjuna, playboy of the Eastern world; a fat, hermaphroditic clown appears in the glorious form of a divinity. The Sundanese do not necessarily feel, as I believe most Americans do, that our individual human body and soul are inextricably bound together till death do us part: This lyric on the moveable soul, sung for each of the many transformations that may occur in a performance, tells us as much. It would not occur to the Sundanese to worry, as I did in the back rows of my Catholic school classroom, about the age and state of development my body would have reached when Gabriel's horn called it forth for eternal reunion with my soul at the world's end.

Memoirs of a Catholic girlhood may seem an odd beginning to a de- scription of how performers in West Java learn to "multiply" their bodies in performance by learning to play via masks (topeng) and puppets (wa- yang). Yet the recollections, I hope, suggest the distance I have traveled in my 15 years of studying the theatre of West Java. Though I speak as an individual, my experiences participate in the cultural distance that exists between a contemporary Westerner's passionate embrace of the individual body, personal identity, and history as the beginning point from which an artist works to sketch her/his view of the world, and the way the Sundan- ese and Cirebonese people of West Java work against individual manner- isms, personality, and history to find the range these circumstances of life limit. The distance I have traveled, though it seems vast, is no longer than the three-foot trip up the human spinal column: the stylized characters that each performer learns to dance as masks and manipulate as puppets are, I will reveal, ways of introducing the performer to different energies and balance points that are latent in each human body. Through the one body we inhabit in this life we can, with the help of these puppets or masks and the ideas they encode, embody the whole cosmos.

The Drama Review 34, no. 2 (T126), Summer 1990o

62

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies 63

This trip is introduced to the performer via training that may extend over a semiformal learning period of two to ten years, though childhood exposure prepares the way. Through observation of teachers' perform- ances of mask dance and puppetry and the rote physical replication of the teachers' gestures, with little verbal or written explanation, the student lets the new patterns of movement and vocalization enter daging lan darah, his "flesh and blood." Thereafter, the student is expected to intuitively under- stand the meaning of the practice.

I will discuss the performance practice of West Java in three ways: I) creating distance, 2) introducing the character types of mask and puppet work, and 3) comprehending the system. The order roughly replicates the process that I experienced learning the dance and puppet theatre of West Java and corresponds to the way Sundanese performers of today articulate their own artistic development.1

Creating Distance

The body of the artist in topeng, wayang, and virtually all the traditional theatre of West Java,2 is ideologically distanced from the bodies of the characters presented in performance. A conventionalized system of move- ment and vocal stylization defines the characters' sex, age, and nature. Masks and puppets highlight this separation of character from performer. The training, likewise, creates distance between the performer and what is performed. Moving away from real life is the first step of training. Through emulating the teacher in stylized theatrical movement and voice,

1. Dalang Abah Sunarya performs the exorcistic way- ang golek play The Origin of Kala, in which a refined character is seized by the de- mon Kala. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

;Ui-

1: 7

a _~?-"i~E?. ~'

:-: :

::.?:

i: "u-

;";

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

64 Kathy Foley

the student develops a wide range of types which may include a character analogous to her own as well as other more distant characters. The preference for set characterizations is sustained by the fact that solo

puppetry and mask performances (genres benefiting from stylization) are considered the oldest and most important theatres in West Java, as in much of Southeast Asia. Theatre by multiple performers is considered less im- portant, an innovation of the last two or three centuries, and, except in the modern drama experiments of the university-educated elite beginning in the late 1960s, movement and voice characterization in this human theatre are consciously modeled on conventions of the puppet/mask characters.3

As a result of these conventions, the Sundanese do not demand that the gender, age, or even species of the performer and the character coincide- men play women, women play men. Septuagenarians may be singled out for their fine representations of adolescent characters; and demons, gods, and animals are all felt to be splendidly performable by human beings. The proper focus of study in this sytem is not wo/mankind, but the totality of beings that make up the universe. This system recognizes that the particu- lars of bodily life change with gender, age, and circumstances, but that souls are more comprehensive and in need of fuller exercise: the individual "soul" participates in the overall cosmic power manifest in all things con- tinuing eternally; material "abodes"-bodies-are limited and temporary containers of this force.

Thus, ideological gender equality is part of the system, and men and women have traditionally had access to the roles of dancer, puppeteer, and actor along the north coast of West Java, performing all the varied parts (Foley 1987). Admittedly more specialization of the sexes does emerge in the highlands which are inhabited by Sundanese-speaking people. In this area women have closer association with mask dance than puppetry, and some genres in which they appear were associated with prostitution in the pre-I945 colonial period (Arjo 1989). Males were and still are the pup- peteers in the Sundanese highlands.

Set character types, bodies, masks, or puppets are presented as change- able abodes for the more unitary and enduring power of the performer's soul. This more encompassing energy takes many forms not distinguished by age, gender, or rank. Benedict Anderson's essay "The Idea of Power in Java" is useful for understanding why "object theatre" is so attractive to people in this part of the world:

Power is that intangible, mysterious, and divine energy which ani- mates the universe. It is manifested in every aspect of the natural world, in stones, trees, clouds, and fire, but is expressed quintessen- tially in the central mystery of life, the process of generation and regeneration. In Javanese traditional thinking there is no sharp divi- sion between organic and inorganic matter, for everything is sus- tained by the same invisible power (1972:7).

This power is not of itself good or evil; human, animal, or divine. Though containers change, the power is the same. Energy that in one manifestation may be a human being, may at other points in time inhabit the body of a tiger, or lodge within a tree or atop a mountain after death. The human soul participates in this power as does everything and our individual bodies are tools whereby we can begin to experience and, gradually, understand this power cycling through the world. The dancer or the dalang who moves many different figures but is not bound forever

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies 65

to a single one, shows how unitary power activates/is active in the uni- verse. By moving away from oneself in puppetry and mask performance, one better understands the potential of the self: the possibility for positive and/or negative actualizations of the power latent within all beings.

The topeng and wayang theatre radically separates performer (power) and the performed character (individual manifestation of the power). That is why the training moves first away from the performer's personality only to later reintegrate it in the new system developed through continued practice. It is interesting to note that the American actor trained in the Stanislavski system usually begins by drawing closer to the self; early acting assignments are often characters close to the performer in age and type, certainly in gender, race, and species.

The Sundanese or Cirebonese dancer, regardless of personality, begins by learning a refined character whose slow, measured movement and melodious, centered voice are considered furthest from the ordinary self. By starting with the character which stretches the average performer most, the system tries to enfranchise him/her with the full potential range. Al- though individual performers may exhibit a special aptitude for a particular type of character, most consciously abjure cultivating favorites.4 I believe this is because they are sensitive to the fact that in mask and puppet theatre performers are not dedicated to any particular type, since this would limit command of the full cycle of characters. The training is designed to give each performer multiple personae, with different vocal, energy, and spatial usages-different "bodies"--so that the performer can ultimately realize that all the masks of the "other" are merely sides of the eternal self. The major masks represent the directions of the world, the ages of life, and the elements of the universe. All these inhabit each human being.

The Masks

The mask and puppet traditions of West Java are based on a sequence of set character types that find their clearest representations in the topeng babakan (literally, "masked acts") of the north coast city of Cirebon.5 Four major masked characters are presented in a storyless, six-hour performance by a dalang. In times past, this dalang would also be the narrator of a masked drama (wayang topeng), or sometimes a puppet play using shadow (wayang kulit) or wooden rod figures (wayang cepak).6 The creation of both topeng and various forms of wayang is attributed by performers to the Javanese holy man Sunan Kalijaga and his eight companions who con- verted Java to Islam in the late I6th century.7 Although the exact number of masks that are danced in a performance in any particular village of the Cirebon area varies, the four classes (very refined, semirefined, warrior, and emotionally uncontrolled) are always in evidence. In the masked per- formance, dancers usually call the four figures by character names-while in the unmasked dances and puppetry of that area, a word categorizing the personality is more often used to identify the type. In the descriptions that follow I will give the mask names used in the village of Slangit with the name for the Sunda personality type in parentheses. A description of the movement and the vocalization will give a sense of the actual performance of each particular type.

Panji (lungguh-very refined) is generally the first mask presented. A delicate white mask with an aquiline nose and thin, elongated eyes, this legendary prince Panji is considered by the Javanese to be a great cultural hero. The music that accompanies Panji is complex and the dance, while

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

66 Kathy Foley

2. The refined character mask, associated with Panji, is presented in a topeng dance drama in Cirebon. In this instance, the dalang speaks the dialog through a microphone as the performers dance the story. The seated figure in the half-mask is a clown character. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

3. Dalang Sujana Arja of Slangit village performs the dance ofthe refined mask, Panji. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

::: ~::.-:-: i

- ::::

?- :: : ;.:: :?'::::

-- - & -???

a :

I-: - ::..;.

CP"?:in 'Q

1 ii arra~ss~~i: ;~-i-::: :: I'il ? -i~e gXI~*

$h?a:

"~?? aa?

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

appearing to be almost stationary when viewed from the outside, demands the most intense internal focus and undivided concentration. In mastering the dance the performer learns to subtly shift the weight of his/her feet from toe to ball so the character can move imperceptibly toward the audi- ence. The slightest head accents mark the heavy stroke of the gong, while subtle shoulder rolls awaken precise articulations on the spine and activate an unobstructed, if almost unseeable, energy flow that is the character. The otherworldly aura of Panji is immediately apparent to the performer, but not necessarily engaging to the audience. Endo Suanda, a student of Sujana Arja, a major contemporary topeng performer in Slangit, notes, "This dance, it seems to me, is more for the dalang's inner satisfaction or medita- tion than for the audience's entertainment" (Suanda I983:Io4).

The dancer moves relaxedly in the space defined by his/her natural kinesphere. Panji's visual focus is directed to the ground about a body length in front of him, almost giving the impression of being recycled back into his body. What I will call the center of gravity,8 by which I mean the area of the body where the dancer places the energy focus, is low, in the umbilical area near the base of the spine. This extension of energy toward the earth and the maintenance of a wide, deep pli6 allows all the parts of the body above this center to give a floating impression. A sphere of energy is created, but it slows down time, negates space, and is turned back on itself rather than grabbing the audience. It pushes the dancer into the self and urges him/her to savor the slightest movements, especially those originat- ing where the shoulders and head meet the spine. The vocal placement associated with Panji is created by focusing the sound in the mouth cavity while letting the jaw drop and relax even as the upper jaw raises slightly creating extra space. "Masaman" is a tuning word which is used for Panji. The speaker first draws out the syllables, placing the voice comfortably, then continues into the slow expansive sentences of Panji's speeches.9

Panji is the most relaxed and economical in his energy and space usage, but this very economy of movement, combined with complexity of music, balanced center, and inner quality make Panji's character difficult to achieve. Ideologically Panji is said to represent the ruler, the direction north, mutmainah (peace), the color white, the ancestral origins of the Javanese which are associated with mountain tops (a favored abode for ancestral beings), fertility, rain, and semen. Panji is said to be the child newly entered into the world testing out his senses. It is interesting to note that Panji achieves all these images associated with high, eternally flowing fertility, by keeping his center low. What goes down, must float up. I associated Panji with the head, since the movement directs the mind up into itself and traditional imagery reinforces this interpretation: north and mountains are associated with the head. The island ofJava is perceived as a body with the northern mountains comprising its head and the southern ocean its nether regions.

Pamindo (ladak-semirefined) is the second mask, with a white face and curly dark hair. The movement is dynamic, nimble and joyful, while remaining refined and maintaining a center of gravity in the navel region. Shoulders swivel, floor pattern curves, and wrists undulate with a full sense of flow. The character is said to be adolescent, a coquettish female,10 rejoicing in the delights of her world. This mask is frequently used to represent princesses. She giggles, fixes betel leaf, combs her hair, pretends to peer into a mirror, using stylized gestures to connote these actions. She sits with legs extended in front and softly jackknifes her body with the arms extended high over her head, and seems to fall asleep. Then, ever so

My Bodies 67

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

68 Kathy Foley

4. The refined,feminine mask, Pamindo, performed by the Dalang Sujana Arja, is second in the sequence. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

B ss

-br _::

''~??

gradually, she rises, unfolds her body and arms until, head up and arms to either side, she seems a bird soaring upward and forward.

Indeed the movements from this seated part to the end of the dance often have names of birds (usually swan or crane) and are felt to be imitative of these creatures. It seems possible that the sequence from sitting to soaring is a vestige of more ritual performances which connect birds and ancestral spirits in a wide area of the Pacific.11 These bird associations are felt to be significant by performers who relate Pamindo to a bird saying hers is the oldest topeng dance from which the others derive (see Rogers-Aguiniga I986).

The character focuses on the audience, looking at the ground about two body lengths in front of herself; she luxuriates in, but does not confront, the viewer's gaze directly. The vocal resonance associated with Pamindo is two notes of the gamelan scale above the rounded vocalization of the Panji character. To create the voice the performer directs the stream of sound toward the hard palate and the upper teeth. The tuning sound which produces this resonance is "ke-ke-ke," and a quick breathless pace is used for delivering the dialog. Pamindo is associated with the west, supiyah (possessiveness), the color yellow, and is felt to be the individual wander- ing here and there looking for her mission in the world. Pamindo is refined like Panji, but her higher center allows for more quixotic use of space and time and for greater audience interaction. While Panji is firmly aligned with the clearest consciousness of self and head, I associate Pamindo's character with possibilities that are slightly dangerous but exciting, the floating possibilities that twisting and turning and total concentration can allow to flow free. The association of Pamindo with the west links her with sunset, death, and the difficult but exciting energy of the left hand.

The next major character type to appear is Tumenggung (punggawa- official, warrior), a prime minister whose rose-colored mask has a curling moustache. His use of space and time is more direct and energetic. His visual focus is directly toward the audience. Wide strides are his customary step, and quickly repeating gongs make it easy for the dancer to signal transitions from one movement sequence to the next. The complex pat- terns of movement (and implied complexity of thought) that characterize Panji and Pamindo are simplified. The deep, throaty, reverberating voice associated with Tumenggung is attained by tightening the folds of the

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies 69

5. A female dalang, Ibu Sawitri ofLosari village, dances the mask of Tumeng- gung, a strong male in the prime of life. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

t it Ul-~e4~

r:

-..

j

vocal cords and utilizing the chest as the major resonator. The speech is considered, its delivery slow. The center of gravity for this character is higher on the spine, in back of the solar plexus, and this pulling up of energy allows for freer movement of the legs which swing wide from the hip joint permitting Tumenggung to cover ground quickly. His big move- ments command wider audience attention. Tumenggung is felt to be a male character of 40, in the prime of life. He is associated with the east, black, luwamah (determination), growth, and strength. Though with his high center he is less firmly planted than the earlier characters, his forceful energy gives the impression he accomplishes more in the immediate mo- ment. Tumenggung's connection with the east and forcefulness link him with the power of the right hand.

Finally the mask Klana (angkara murka-emotionally uncontrolled) ap- pears. His red face and fangs denote the emotional uncontrol that is frowned upon in Java and associated with ogres and demons. Klana is Panji's opponent and is usually enamored of Pamindo. Klana is a man in the throes of death, but longing greedily for life. Short, sharp shocks of movement, jumps, and kicks characterize his dance. His visual focus skims over the audience's heads. Vectors of force radiate from Klana's center of gravity, high on his spine near the top of the chest, and slam into the audience as Klana claims a universe of space. The nasal resonators are activated in creating his implosive, quick voice which rises and swoops over an octave, utilizing a tessitura ofmadenda, a minor key that shares only three notes with the five-toned salendro musical scale adhered to by the other characters in their talking. The mood song which introduces Klana's arrival gives a sense of his character:

The crying of Dasamuka is in the wind, a fight in the air, his chest was pecked and it cracked, Lives again after he dies, remembers the incantation ofPancasona (Suanda 1983:142)12

Klana's scattershot energy focuses in the high chest. This allows his limbs to move relatively broadly and freely underneath.13 Much of the movement activates the spine where the neck meets the head. This joint is

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

70 Kathy Foley

jerked and wrenched during his dance, especially at the end of the slow opening passage as the dancer prepares to put on Klana's mask. This is the point in the dance that the "warm up" ends and the performer is felt to "put on" this demon king character.

Klana interacts most dynamically with the audience, laughing at them, tossing a cloth to them, touching a child. Klana is associated with the south, the regions beneath, amarah (passion), death, menstruation, and fire. Klana's high center of gravity allows explosive energy to pour forth. Klana is the climax of the performance, and the obverse of Panji's eternally recycled conservation of energy. Klana is technically the easiest to per- form. His movements are less precise than the prior characters and, since the musical cycles are quick, the dancer can change movement sequences almost at will. But he is ideologically the hardest to control, the most potentially dangerous. While seasoned performers remain in control, un- practiced performers court dangerous trancelike states where the character overpowers the performer. Klana evokes the volcanic and is apt to ex- plode.

Ironically, by activating the top of the spine and shaking the head in swift, sharp movements, and by slamming the voice against the top of the head, the deepest emotions can pour forth. Klana is born from the depths and waits until the dancer releases him by opening at the top of the spine.'14 The Sundanese are in no rush to do this. The dancer spends the first hours of each performance as Panji, Pamindo, and Tumenggung. Likewise the early years oftopeng learning train the performer to focus on the lower end of the spine.

A refined character related to Panji or Pamindo is introduced first. The choice seems odd when compared to much Western training where freeing the natural voice and activating the deep psychophysical system of the actor often advocates large energy and emotional stretches early in training to break down barriers which prevent the performer from understanding her/his "natural" state.15 Such training, it seems to me, was especially prominent in the 1970s when Grotowski-influenced physical exercises, Lessac's call, and American variants of Stanislavski-influenced emotional memory were introduced to me. In Sunda these big movements and emo-

- 1":??"::: -:::: :

6. Klana, an emotionally uncontrolled demon king, is the final mask presented in each performance. Sujana Arja dances the role. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

1?13 st

i--: : -:li-:::: :::::i 1. .;??; iii. .

":

:--::

;-1

I J

-: ': -:: ":-:

I ril~:

I': ,, 1:::

tions are what the performer is asked to activate last-probably because they are considered the easiest to achieve and the most difficult to control. Starting with Klana would leave both the student mastering the system and a performance building toward a climax with no place to go. To begin with Klana misunderstands the significance the system ascribes to this powerful material. The traditional training system asks the novice to begin with what is most complex, most stationary, most subtle, and most difficult.

In both the past and the present, the mask with its set image of a type, like the unchanging representations in the puppet theatre, are nonverbal tools that release the body to find the movement, voice, and idea of a character. Endo Suanda, a noted dancer of today's generation, discusses his different strategies in learning topeng which progressed from rational anal- ysis, to emotive response, to letting the mask move him:

Most of the movements that I saw or felt, I could not analyze how to do, as they were too small, too subtle or too quick. So finally I stopped trying to analyze the physical design of the movement, and instead focused my attention on absorbing the sensuality or expres- sion of the whole movement while I was studying or practicing. After a while I knew that I moved my head unconsciously. [ ... ] Because the mask is worn it makes the head of the dancer move. [. . .] Wearing a mask means having a different face, so it will definitely change his expression and create different movements (1983:203-204).

7. Young dancers in Losari village near Cirebon execute Pamindo movements. This refined character is customar- ily studied first. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

72 Kathy Foley

Irawati Durban Arjo, another noted topeng performer, agrees that the mask comes to dance the dancer: "After wearing the mask, I feel stronger. You have to be sensitive to it first and it will expand into everything you move. I can feel more of the character when I wear the mask. Klana is very powerful and can act as he wants" (Arjo I988). By opening the body to the influence of evocative traditional images and following the prescribed or- der of characters, the dance and its meaning become part of the performer's body.

Comprehending the System The cycle of dances is a trip around the periphery of the body, from head

(Panji) to left hand (Pamindo) to right hand (Tumenggung) to gut (Klana), while the center of gravity moves directly up the spine from low (Panji) to high (Klana). Opposition is inherent in these simultaneously occurring

8. Irawati Durban Arjo dances Klana in the style of Losari village, Cirebon. (Photo by Don Harris)

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

voyages. Panji is ideologically at the top (head) and actually at the bottom (lower spine), while Klana is ideologically at the bottom (gut) and actually at the top (upper spine). The tension between the two points pushes the mind toward the idea of center which plays an important part in Southeast Asian thinking (see Errington I983). Pamindo and Tumenggung are closer to the central point on the spinal journey, but not precisely there. Indeed, the dancer is invited to find this point herself, or in some villages in a fifth character, Rumiang, whose movement is between Pamindo and Tumeng- gung in forcefulness and is introduced to pinpoint the central focus. The reason that the Rumiang mask is lacking in some areas may be that it is redundant, a replication of what the dancer is who knows all his/her pow- ers-centered.

Though different "bodies" in terms of rhythm and movement dynamics seem to appear with each dance, the sum of the characters always adds up to one person's moving body. The impact of the' training is to create a repertory of beings that force the performer to know his/her many poten- tial bodies. These characters are emotionally the different aspects of his/her soul, peace (Panji), possessiveness (Pamindo), power (Tumenggung), and passion (Klana); different aspects of the social order, the ruler (Panji), the princess (Pamindo), the warrior (Tumenggung), the opponent (Klana); conceptually, an accelerated trip through his/her life cycle from birth (Panji), through adolescence (Pamindo), adulthood (Tumenggung), to death (Klana); a preview of the cycle that each individual will repeatedly pass through in his/her regeneration from a god-ancestor showering benefit on the world (Panji), to a youth dreaming worlds that might be (Pamindo), to a person building worlds that must be (Tumenggung), to a demon-ancestor rumbling dangerously beneath the volcanic earth (Klana), waiting for the eruption which will mark the transition into Panji once more. It is clear that the multiple movement possibilities and layering of imagery provides rich stimulation for the muscles of the performer's body and mind. Traditional performers of topeng or wayang scoff at the need to forge new idioms of movement or theatre and are apt to assert, as did one dalang I interviewed, that "Everything is in the wayang already" (Sukarya I977).

Rather than explore the many possibilities of this system, I wish merely to note two alternative transformations, animal and ecological, that are implied rather than stated. These permutations are evocative in that they go beyond what Western thinking or acting ordinarily invites as a transfor- mation of the human body and/or social order. Topeng invites us to expe- rience a bird/snake dichotomy by highlighting Pamindo and Klana, and a tree/mountain permutation by dancing the whole sequence. While these changes may seem removed from the human body, actually they begin and end in the body.

BIRD AND THE SNAKE

Though the system presently yields four character types, this is really an elaboration on what may be an older pairing of two. In many ways, Panji and Tumenggung, while ideologically important as positive images, do not lie at the heart of topeng. The dance really focuses more on the other two characters, Pamindo and Klana, who are more integral to the perform- ance. In villages like Losari near Cirebon the Panji dance is not done; the Pamindo mask is called "Panji." In a variety of introductory mask dance performances of the Sundanese area, Panji is missing while Pamindo,

My Bodies 73

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

74 Kathy Foley

Klana, and sometimes Tumenggung remain. Dancers like Sujana Arja aver that Pamindo's is the oldest dance, the source of the other dances. Indeed, a marked choreographic symmetry exists between Pamindo's and Klana's dances. The former, I believe, shows us our "bird" possibility, while the latter teaches us the energy of the "snake."

As noted before, the Pamindo dance has many movements which are imitative of a bird. This may correspond to the importance of the bird in a wide area (see Holt I967:Io6). Pamindo incarnates the possibilities of the human in motion; the flightlike potentiality of this dance in its extreme becomes the sleep-walking trance of female mediums found in roughly the same area as topeng.16 The lowered center of gravity, coupled with twist- ing, turning motions, brings the body as close as it can come to flying. In Sunda and Java the images of birds are often found on dance headdresses. Most characters in dance dramas and many female dances in nonnarrative dances have eagle or peacock designs on their leather headgear. This cos- tume, in addition to marking a now defunct religious heritage which asso- ciated the eagle with Garuda, the vehicle of the Hindu god Vishnu, is a performed assertion that when we lower our center of gravity we all can "fly."

The Klana dance exhibits a jerkier whipping of the spine, an energy related to a high center of gravity which stimulates the head-neck connec- tion. I link this Klana dance to nagas, mythical snakes that dwell in the earth, which in Indonesian as well as Indian mythology are the opponents of Garuda. Elsewhere I have noted that jumps and jerks characterize male trance performance in this area (Foley 1985); I think a change of conscious- ness is activated by hyperstimulation of the nervous system. This tech- nique of transformation differs radically from the flightlike feeling of the Pamindo dancer. Klana's jerking spine, with special emphasis on the head- neck connection, while clearly not a trance performance, may be similar to trance in that this movement technique releases the emotions of the gut- sexuality, hunger, greed, power. Such emotions are associated with nagas, coiled beneath the earth creating fertility but, if uncontrolled, threatening chaos. Although not explicit in topeng, the naga theme is implicitly evoked. Naga seser, "the naga defeated," is the wide plid position found in the topeng choreography of Losari village. In Arja's Klana, the dancer takes out a dagger (kris) worn at the waist and points it in front of him as he reaches a highpoint in the dance. The wavy-bladed knife is patterned to look like a snake, and both naga and dagger are associated with male sexual potency. The floor pattern zig-zags back and forth in this sequence, reiterating the naga theme."17

When I do Klana, especially after enjoying the birdlike flight of Pamindo, I have the sense of my subcortical consciousness being jerked to life, as if Klana awakened some sense-memory of my neural column's reptilian prehistory. Klana is naga power incarnate, and yet, paradoxically, this power is activated by pushing the focal point of the dancer up the spinal cord.1s The bird-snake identification is important to humans far beyond Java. It is widespread through the world and is often said to have shamanic origins. Even Catholicism gave me images of holy ghosts in bird bodies bringing ecstasy to Mary and snakes slithering through Eden seduc- ing Eve. Yet the religious training I received encouraged me to see these mythical creatures outside of me, manipulating me. The study of topeng has given me power over them by showing me that they are parts of me. I dance these creatures to life in my body, identifying myself with the animal world.

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies 75 THE TREE/MOUNTAIN

One last figure from the puppet theatre I wish to relate to topeng is the flat leather puppet called the kayon (tree) or gunungan (mountain) used as a multipurpose tool. Representing the creation of the cosmos, the kayon dance opens each performance. It is placed at the center of the playing space when the dalang narrates between scenes, marking the structural divisions of the story as a curtain might in Western theatre. It is used as an all- purpose set piece in the play, becoming now a rock, next a cloud, then a throne, a gate, a weight. The kayon usually has a winged gate at the bottom which is guarded by two ogres. Behind the gate is a pool, two strong animals (tigers, bulls, etc.) standing facing each other at the base of a tree that grows in the garden. A snake may twine round the trunk which branches where the face or faces of a protective demon, a Kala, appears. High at the top, the tree culminates in a lotus. The imagery and mysticism that surrounds the kayon is very rich and I will merely hint at some of its aspects.

The kayon represents the cosmic whole that makes up the world: the Indonesian version of the world tree and/or mountain found in the iconog- raphy of many cultures. It can become all things in a performance because it is all things, and it reminds Javanese viewers that trees and mountains are the abodes of gods and ancestral souls. Even today, banyan trees with their complicated root systems and far-spreading canopies are the focal point of many villages, while sacred volcanos continue to bring fertility and de- struction. The kayon invites Indonesians to contemplate participation in larger cycles than humans experience in one life span. It invites them, too, to expand their thinking about the human body in a way related to the idea of power discussed earlier. A tree or a mountain, rooted in the earth, extending through the world we inhabit, reaching to the heavens is an axis binding the different layers of life's eternally circling energy. In death one's body is placed in the ground; in a dream one's spirit soars above. But the experience of these other states is also available at any moment. The energy of the macrocosm-represented by the tree or mountain extending from the underworld to our world to the heavens-is not really different from our own personal energy. The same unseen power uses the tree and the mountain, as it does us, as abodes. Although this perspective might seem mystical and esoteric from the Western point of view, it is an ecology of the mind which the traditional Javanese worldview finds simple and prag- matic.

The figures of topeng appropriately appear on the kayon, this cosmic whole, in nonhuman forms. The winged gate represents the female- associated with both the womb that carries each of us to the world, and the winged bird I have linked to Pamindo. The facing animals are figures of our strength and can be associated with the forceful Tumenggung. The Kala head's demonic representation which often rises above the snake is identified with Klana. The lotus at the top is the mind's fulfillment, associ- ated with Panji the baby who, self-realized, descends into the world again and again. Though the kayon is a tree or a mountain, it is also a human. The tree is our spine and the snake is our kundalini energy rising from the genitals, snapping into consciousness once we can confront that point at the top where Klana, our protective Kala head, prods us to full conscious- ness.19 The kayon is the "mask" that the dalang holds in front of him/ herself when s/he delivers the narration. It is the "puppet" s/he hides behind. Yet it is also his/her spine; s/he is the tree, the mountain, the multiple bodies/energies at play in the world. Topeng and wayang with

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

76 Kathy Foley

9. The kayon (tree of life puppet) contains imagery that relates to the masks of topeng. The winged gate is associated with the bird im- age of Pamindo. The facing animals, tiger and water buf- falo, correspond to Tumeng- gung. The demon face on the tree trunk can be compared to Klana. The lotus bud at the top of the puppet corresponds to Panji. (Photo by Kathy Foley)

their typology of characters are ways of guiding first the performer, and through that performer each spectator, toward these wider identifications. A simple trip up the spine, moving from a low center using minimal space and a comfortable vocal range toward higher intensities of energy, wider spaces, and exploding vocalities. At the same time topeng and wayang demand a recognition of the different tendencies of different body parts, the Panji in the head, the Klana in the gut, the quirky Pamindo of the left hand, and the powerful Tumenggung of the right.

A mood song that opens most puppet performances alerts us:

The kayon is a screen that masks the god, masks the one who executes the performance. The puppets breathe through the soul of the dalang. The dalang breathes his soul into the puppets. The kayon screens the unseen power behind.

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies 77

The unseen power is the dalang, the puppetmaster, who is all the puppets at once. How odd that I, who felt bound to one body from here to hereaf- ter, should sing this lyric. The audience does not really know what it means. They only see the bright kayon and the glittering puppets whose faces resemble Panji, Pamindo, Tumenggung, and Klana. They think I am telling stories about long ago and far away-fascinating stories indeed- but not the real story. Topeng and wayang teach me to be the force not bound to my normal body or history. I have many bodies. I participate in both human emotions and volcanic explosions. By exercising my change- ability, I am no longer locked into a one-dimensional view of the world- which is associated with an individual puppet, mask, or life. Performance is a way of speeding up my life cycle, or the many life-death-life cycles, so I can travel from body to soil to reintegration. By speeding up the process I participate actively in the workings of the cosmos. I, the dalang, manipu- late the different entities and forces and finally reach an artistic balance.20 The topeng, the kayon, the cosmos are my bodies.

Notes

I. Some may question my ability to analyze this system without letting precon- ceptions from my own background and training color the study. To an extent these factors will intervene. If they did not exist, I would not be trying to articulate these ideas for the readers of TDR. My argument, however, is that the system reprograms the body/mind of the student without attention to the per- sonality the trainee brings to it. Though my reprogramming may be more extensive and is augmented by exposure to dance systems of a wider area of the Pacific Rim, I feel my body is still open to the meanings of the practice in itself. Indeed, practice is the only way to get beyond the simple introductions that are found in books and the fragmented, albeit tantalizing information about mean- ings that come from performers. Because principles of ilmu gaib (secret mystical knowledge) and kabatinan (spiritual practice) are involved with most traditional performance, the conversations that surround verbalizations about it are charged. If a teacher teaches wrongly, it can cause dispersal of his or her own store of spiritual power, or, even worse, sickness or bad luck. If the teacher speaks and students have not already intuited through doing the ideas the teacher articulates, they cannot understand what is being taught. Most perform- ers say their teachers gave them little direct explanation of mantras or move- ments. Explanations are considered dilutions of the real thing-the doing. I invite performers to test my hypotheses by exploring the performance practices of West Java-while acknowledging that other performers would not necessar- ily concur with all my interpretations.

2. Two major cultural groups exist and continue to influence each others' arts in West Java. The highland areas are comprised of Sundanese speakers who, start- ing two hundred years ago, borrowed many things from the north coastal area where Javanese speakers predominate. The major borrowings have been from the region of the old kingdom of Cirebon, where the arts remain distinct from those of the better-known Central Javanese kingdoms of Solo and Yogyakarta. The generalizations I make about stylization and distancing apply to the per- formances of both the Sundanese and Cirebon areas.

3. The importance of the solo dancer/puppeteer role is probably related to the shamanlike power needed for exorcistic performances, called ruwatan (see Foley 1984). To do these rituals a performer must have spiritual power which is thought to be acquired with difficulty, and, once acquired, best kept at some distance from the spiritual power of another lest the other create a kind of spiritual static, interfering with the first's power/performance. Such circum- stances may have contributed to the preference for solo performers.

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

78 Kathy Foley

4. This is true of the mask and puppet theatre of West Java, but in theatre by humans (wayang orang) and dance dramas (sendratari), specialization is evident in performance practice-not in the training-which requires all performers to master the full cycle of characters. Human theatre has grown up in West Java during the current century.

5. I will use this example and borrow related material from the wayang golek cepak, the 200-year-old Sundanese puppet theatre which derives from the Cirebon region where masks and puppetry are closely interrelated and are traditionally the purview of a single artist. The same mask/puppet/character types are com- mon to virtually all theatre forms of this area. Pigeaud (1938) exhaustively surveyed the theatre and dance forms of the Sundanese, Javanese, and Madurese language areas concluding that the progression of four or five character types was basic to all these ethnic groups. Indeed, a related grouping of four prime characters exists in other Southeast Asian areas, including Bali, Java, Malaysia, Thailand, and Cambodia.

6. The topeng is today danced either during the day or at night. Most performers specialize only in mask performance. Some dalang, like those of Losari, still do puppet or masked dance drama performances in addition to mask dance per- formances. The oral tradition indicates that this was more common in the past.

7. Kalijaga and other Islamic mystics may indeed have reordered the traditional arts of the Hindu-Javanese heritage in this period, but the roots of these practices are probably part of the archaic heritage of the Malayo-Polynesians that in- habited the archipelago even earlier. Though the structure that we see today may have been set when Kalijaga lived, the dance has changed since his time. For example, the dancer today wears a neck ornament distinctly like a European tie and one of the characters wears a starched collar, remarkably like one appro- priate to a European shirt of the early part of this century.

8. There is no term that dancers in Indonesia use to refer to this concept. I reiterate that those who learn the system learn by rote and, hence, would not necessarily analyze the body usage verbally, as I do here.

9. The mask dancer of topeng does not speak since the mask is held to the face by biting a piece of leather attached to the inside of the mask. My comments on voice, therefore, are drawn from the practice of the rod puppet theatre. In masked performances, the clown performer or a musician of the gamelan speaks for the character using a voice which replicates the puppet theatre's vocal con- ventions.

10. As is customary in Indonesia, the opposite is sometimes true too. The Pamindo character is sometimes said to be male-in Losari this mask is used for Panji and in some places it is called Samba, after a son of Kresna. However, most per- formers think of Pamindo as female; it is significant that females in dance plays and puppet presentations correspond in movement and appearance to the Panji or Pamindo character types.

I1. Reverence for the hornbill and the frigate bird, as old religious figures in various areas of the Pacific including Micronesia, and the tendency to enact the move- ments of this bird in dance may be related (see Holt 1967:1o6; Xavier 1976:45- 47).

12. Also known as Rawana, Dasamuka, is the king of Alengka. Pancasona is a power acquired by Dasamuka which let him live again each time he touched the earth.

I3. This character, who uses fully visible energy, is presented most routinely for Western audiences. The explosions of emotion that we have come to expect in performance, the wide use of space, jumps, and the high physical center found in ballet, are closer to Klana than to any of the other characters.

14. Puppet plays like Arjuna's Meditation may corroborate the importance of the upper spine area in the dance of Klana. Nirwatakawaka, whose type (puppet/ mask) is identical to Klana, has a secret power located at the back of his throat which allows him to live forever. It seems possible to me that the narratives of such plays, when reaffirmed by the practice of dance, may be referring to characteristics of the human neural system.

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

My Bodies 79

15. Shelly Errington (1990o) notes that terms like "natural" mask are actually deep cultural choices. In Indonesia, what a Westerner might call "natural" (deeply felt, emotionally fraught, a pouring forth of sound or energy), fits better into the category of"demonic" or "ogrely" and is therefore considered by Indone- sians most unnatural.

16. The sintren, a village trance dancer of the Cirebon region, is said to be possessed by a goddess (bidadari) who descends from the heavens. Her dance exhibits an energy use which is analogous to the refined aspects oftopeng (see Foley 1985).

17. It seems likely that the snake association is related to the use of reptiles in Micronesian dances where iguana or lizard dances stand in marked contrast to frigate bird movements. The contrast seems analogous to the bird-snake dichotomy and may be an adaption of the same thinking to the changing ecol- ogy of the Pacific islands.

18. Even if it seems that the varied sexual responses of the two genders present some analogy-the relaxed, floating Pamindo (female) and excited, driving Klana (male)-indigenous commentary denies this analysis. Indeed, each char- acter is ideologically linked with the opposite of what this sexual interpretation would indicate. The red Klana mask, while always representing a male in stories and puppet plays, is said to indicate the female menses, and the white mask of the refined character, closer to females in stories and puppet plays, is associated with semen.

19. I think it likely that topeng masks are related to Japanese noh which also has a range of masks from god to demon. Possibly much of the imagery traveled with Hindu-Buddhism to the archipelago. Zarrilli's (1988) discussion of the rising vital power in Indian martial arts and the kundalini yoga's awakening of the serpent power to seek liberation, a state beyond death, illness, and worldly care, also seems related. I suspect however that the imagery (bird/serpent, world tree) and the basics of the typology of character preceded Indian influence in this area and was merely reconfirmed and reinterpreted by it. Thus it may stem from common thinking about the body that predated the Hindu impact in Indonesia beginning about the first century, and was merely elaborated during the Hindu- Javanese period before being reformulated by Sufi thinkers in the I6th century. It has been reworked by many generations of dalang since.

2o. For recent discussions of ideas of power in Southeast Asia see Errington (1990); Keeler (1987); and Zurbuchen (1987:46-47).

References Anderson, Benedict 1972 "The Idea of Power in Java." In Politics and Culture in Indonesia, edited

by Claire Holt, Benedict Anderson, and James Siegel, 1-70. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Arjo, Irawati Durban 1988 Personal communication, 12 May. 1989 "Female Dance in West Java." Asian Theatre Journal 6 (no. 2):168-79.

Errington, Shelley 1983 "The Place of Regalia in Luwu." In Centers, Symbols and Hierarchies,

edited by Lorraine Gesick, 194-241. New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies.

1990 "Power and Difference: A Theoretical Overview." In Power and Dif- ference: Gender in Island Southeast Asia, edited by Jane Atkinson and Shelley Errington, Palo Alto, CA: Stanford University Press.

Foley, Kathy 1984 "Dalangs and Dukun, Spirits and Men." Asian Theatre Journal I (no.

I):52-75. 1985 "The Dancer and the Danced: Trance and Theatrical Performance in

West Java." Asian Theatre Journal 2 (no. I):24-40.

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

80 Kathy Foley

1987 "Unmasking Topeng: Cosmology, Cosmogony and Change in the Mask Dance of West Java." Paper presented at the Graduate Dance Ethnology Conference at UCLA, February.

Holt, Clare 1967 Art in Indonesia: Continuity and Change. Ithaca: Cornell University

Press.

Keeler, Ward 1987 Javanese Shadow Plays, Javanese Selves. Princeton: Princeton Univer-

sity Press.

Pigeaud, G. Th. 1938 Javaanse Volksuertoningen. Batavia: Volkslectuur.

Rogers-Aguiniga, Pamela 1986 "Topeng Cirebon: The Masked Dance of West Java as Performed in

the Village of Slangit." Master's thesis, UCLA.

Suanda, Endo 1983 "Topeng Cirebon: In its Social Context." Master's thesis, Depart-

ment of Music, Wesleyan University.

Sukarya, Ukan 1977 Personal communication, 7 September.

Xavier, Sister Mary 1976 "Dancing and Singing in the Gilbert Islands." Mana Review I, no. 2

(December):43-49.

Zarrilli, Phillip 1988 "Three Bodies of Practice in a Traditional South Indian Martial Art."

Social Sciences and Medicine 28 (no. I2):I289-I3Io.

Zurbuchen, Mary 1987 The Language of Balinese Shadow Theatre. Princeton, NJ: Princeton

University Press.

Kathy Foley is an Associate Professor of Theatre Arts at the University of California at Santa Cruz and Provost of Porter College. She performs and teaches Indonesian wayang and dance drama and was the first non-Indonesian invited to perform Sundanese wayang at the premier festival of Indonesian performance, the Quadrennial Wayang Festival. This article was facilitated by research funded by the Academic Senate at UCSC, the Asian Cultural Council, and the East-West Center.

TDReading

For more on wayang topeng see John Emigh's "Playing with the Past: Visitation and Illusion in the Mask Theatre of Bali, I Nyoman Kakul'sJelantik Goes to Blambangan," and Ron Jenkin's "Becoming a Clown in Bali," TDR 23, no. 2 (T82); and Laurie Sears's "Aesthetic Displacement in Javanese Shadow Theatre: Three Contemporary Performance Styles," TDR 33, no. 3 (TI23). See also Richard Schechner's "Wayang Kulit in the Colonial Margin" in this issue.

This content downloaded from 128.114.165.87 on Tue, 11 Nov 2014 13:44:55 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions