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8 + 1 things
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8 + 1 things I have learned about the body from a decade plus exploration of Indian Dance and Movement Forms
by
Brandy Leary for The Yoga Festival 2010, Toronto, ON
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Over the past 12 years I have moved between Canada and India to train, study, teach, perform and choreograph work that integrates the dance styles of Chhau (Seraikella and Mayurbhanj), Kalarippayattu(South Indian Martial Art) and Mallakhamb (Indian Aerial rope). All of these movement idioms pay homage to the ancient practice of yoga through their systems of training, philosophical frameworks, meditative practices, mythologies and physical vocabularies.
Throughout this journey I have been blessed with many great teachers who have given openly, respectfully, wisely and with great reverence and even greater discipline. I have lived for many months at a time in semi tribal villages without running water or electricity, danced in temperatures of 50C plus, performed before Kings and Queens, been witness to ancient rituals of seemingly impossible feats and learned deeply about the humbleness of practice and its transformative dimensions. I thank Scott and Matthew for asking me to think on this subject, it was a joyous distillation.
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8+1
2. Physical vocabularies that have been refined through thousands of bodies over hundreds of years are fluid and powerful systems with infinite combinations.
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For me this falls into the idea of collective resonance, where a movement idiom can accumulate deeper dimensions of energy, richness or significance through the contribution and participation of many, over long periods of time. It first occurred to me in a consideration of the vocabulary of Modern/Contemporary dance and that of Indian dance. As a vocabulary system Western Modern Dance is a 20th century evolution where Indian Dance forms have had a longer development path over the past few hundred (some claim thousands) of years.* This experience for me is similar to being in an ancient temple or church that is still in use today and then being in one that is brand new. Both are places where people gather to worship, both often are stunningly beautiful, breath taking even, but somehow different. The difference for me lies in the layers of energy that have washed through and saturated a place or in the case of a physical vocabulary, the body. This energetic layering is not just the viewpoint or energy of a few, but of hundreds and thousands of participants over vast periods of time resulting in endless permutations, fluidity and combinations.
* this does not ignore the fact that many Indian Dance forms as known today are the result of revival and reconstruction in the early 20th century as part of the Indian Dance Renaissance. However this period of codification drew on pre-existing dance traditions and vocabulary.
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3. The poetry of the body springs from the finely tuned energetic system and not solely from external physicality. Inner grace fills out the physical manifestation of form.
We all love virtuosity to some degree. Brilliant feats of physical prowess slightly tinged with an edge of danger are truly exciting. However thrilling these experiences can be I often find them fleeting, like a sugar high that has an intense rush but then a deflating and sometimes disappointing crash. It is like perfection. Watching perfect technique is really only interesting for about five minutes, unless there is something more underneath. This is not to say that poor technique should ever reign supreme but if it is not supported with an inner grace or expression it can appear as empty form; beautiful but lacking in substance. This inner depth and grace opens the body up to a multitude of truths, meanings and questions that create transformational moments. The ability to drop into this level of working comes from not only tuning the physical instrument but also from tuning the energetic one, our subtle and expansive body. |
4. Every form, every movement you create should have rasa.
Rasa is a fundamental aesthetic concept of the Indian performing and visual arts. It derives from the Sanskrit which literally translates as 'juice' or 'essence'. It is the inner life of the work, the movement or the moment being created and is that which gives it a fullness, a depth, and is the essential element for something to be transformative It is the ineffable inner grace. It is also a relationship. What you create with your forms should have its essence translated to those viewing them, allowing the event to be revolutionary for both the participant and the viewer.
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5. Patience is required for opening and evolving. Practice (riyaz) is required to cultivate patience.
Patience is the great gift of any practice.
Riyaz is the offering. Riyaz is the countless hours of effort and practice put into any activity. It requires sincerity, humbleness, dedication and discipline. Riyaz is our contemporary 10,000 hours. Riyaz is repetition. It is work and joy and joyous work. It is a requirement.
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6. Repetition
Repetition is reverence. Repetition is depth.
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7. Bhagavad Gita Chapter 4.18
karmany akarma yah pasyed akarmani ca karma yah/
sa buddhiman manusyesu sa yuktah krtsna-karma-krt//
One who perceives inaction in action and action in inaction is wise. Such a person is spiritually situated while engaged in all types of work.
This is the Gita verse that resonates throughout all of my endeavours. I have read many translations of it which offer beautiful interpretations but perhaps the most stunning is Eknath Easwaran's in which he translates action and inaction as movement and stillness. I look for this quality in everything and seek it in my performers when I am creating.
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8. The quality of power has many different interpretations and expressions.
Power in the west is often viewed as competitive, physical, militaristic, corporate or political. Our images of physical power are often about exerted force, bulging muscles and extreme feats; amazing or dangerous, often better if they are both. Indian movement languages offer different and multi layered explorations of what power is, how it is created and how it is expressed. Central to these practices is the element of tapas or the creation of intense heat often through physical tasks that master perceived limitations of physicality by drawing on inner resources, control and fortitude. This heat or fire is the transformative element. It involves the resources of both the body and the mind. Power is an inner quality as well as outer, a spiritual element as well as a physical one. |
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9. There is truth in the body.
Consciously or Unconsciously we all know this.
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1. The body is not real.
At the age of 24, I spent an extended period of time studying in the remote village of Seraikella. Originally part of Orissa, now in the modern day state of Jharkhand, Seraikella is in the tantric belt of eastern India spilling out of Bengal and through Orissa. The annual Chhau dance festival is associated with the the spring ritual rites of the Chaitra Parva celebrations that occur throughout this area. The rituals are ancient and have shifted over the years but root themselves in the relationship of Shiv/Shakti through numerous tantric and bhakti rites. There are many physical tests that the participants under go through out the festival period including two weeks of prescribed fasting and on the final day a series of rituals that involve walking over hot coals, lying on beds of nails (that have been split and sharpened) and piercing the flesh with hooks while suspended from great heights. These activities occur on the morning after the dances have finished, when the community has been up all night witnessing and dancing the stories of their world, ending always with the Mahishasura Mardini (Durga's slaying of the Buffalo Demon).
At the time I was just beginning to get an inkling of the possibilities that you can transcend seemingly physical limitation; hours of intense dance practice in gruelling heat was opening up my body and mind to that possibility. Hours of repetition of the same movement phrase confronted my ego and deepened me. However, after two weeks of rituals, three nights of dance festivities and the culmination of the rites where I stood in a crowd of thousands watching the Bhakti s move through logically impossible physical feats, all accompanied with intense heat and drumming where members of the crowd, young and old, female and male, were falling into trance did I truly realize, there is more. The body as we know it is not real. |
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