Balinese 'gambuh' loses its guardian mother

Rucina Ballinger ,  Contributor, Denpasar   |  Thu, 07/31/2008 10:25 AM  |  Surfing Bali

This month, we have lost two pillars in the world of gambuh: I Ketut Kantor of Batuan, who died of a stroke, and Cristina Wistari Formaggia, who spearheaded The Gambuh Preservation Project in 1992.

Cristina Wistari Formaggia died of cancer in her hometown of Milano, Italy on July 19. Just one month before, she was busily preparing the Pura Desa Batuan troupe to perform in Europe: Her dedication to the classical performing arts of Bali knew no bounds.

Cristina had been a serious student of Asian arts for decades. Her interest in the ceremonial paintings of women led her to live in Mithila, a remote area of northern India. Subsequent journeys took her to the Hindukush in Northern Pakistan where an almost extinct tribe, the Kafir Kalash, dwells.

She studied kathakali, a South Indian dance drama, for two years. In Kerala, she worked with Guru Gopinath, one of the great masters of this art.

On reading Antonin Artaud's essay on Balinese theater in his book, she was drawn inevitably to Bali and its rich Hindu culture, complex rituals, and metaphysical dance theater. The study of Topeng, a masked dance drama, was a catalyst for further development. And she began studying and performing gambuh in earnest in the 1990s.

From 1995 she conducted ongoing research with ISTA (the International School of Theater Anthropology), directed by Eugenio Barba.

Since 1985, she had been teaching and performing in various festivals throughout Europe, Australia, Asia and South America.

Anyone who knew Cristina understood that when she put her mind to something, she got it done. She was precise, thorough and intense. And one of the very few foreigners who have been able to totally embody the essence of Balinese movement in her own body.

She lived a very simple life: Her Ubud home, set back behind the Ibah Hotel, was a simple one-room affair with very little furniture. Short wooden steps led up to a tiny sleeping loft and her open-air kitchen was big enough for one person and a two-burner stove. She disliked clutter and loved living among the greenery and the river that ran below her.

She was a strict vegetarian and did not smoke, always berating those around her who did. Her lifestyle was so healthy that it is hard to imagine that cancer of the brain, liver and lungs finally took her away from us.

When Cristina first came to Bali in 1983, it was to recover from a near-fatal car accident she had in Australia, which badly injured her neck. She was planning on going back to India to study Kathakali again. But, fate had something else in mind for her.

She began studying Balinese dance, specifically the baris warrior dance and then the topeng mask dance-drama. She studied with none other than the great topeng master, I Made Jimat of Batuan.

The village of Batuan is famous for gambuh and there are four existing troupes there today. Cristina would see rehearsals of Gambuh at Jimat's home and there she became fascinated by this ancient form of dance.

Gambuh at that point in time was only done for temple festivals, mainly local, in Batuan and for some of the larger ceremonies at Besakih and other temples. Yet as the form was not so popular with the Balinese, it was in danger of dying out.

Along with a number of scholars and performers, Cristina began the Gambuh Preservation Project funded by the Ford Foundation. Beginning in l993, committees were formed to study and research the music, movements, literature and history of gambuh.

The Gambuh Preservation Project plays a fundamental role in keeping a precious tradition alive in contemporary Balinese society. The gambuh of Batuan is one of the rare examples of a highly aesthetic art that was still being performed in its complete form when the project began.

The main aim of the project in Batuan is to prevent the loss of gambuh and to ensure continuity of the teaching of the dance, with the old masters passing down their knowledge to the new generation.

A decision was made to limit the performance to two hours; some argued that tourists wouldn't be able to sit through even that much traditional dance. But Cristina was adamant that authenticity should reign and two hours of spectacle held.

A two-volume book was written on the music and movements entitled Gambuh: Drama Tari Bali (Gambuh: a Balinese Dance-Drama), which was edited by Cristina and published by Lontar Press of Jakarta in 2000. A DVD and series of cassette tapes were also produced, containing interviews with the old masters as well as documentation of the movements, music and dialogue of each styles. The cassettes are currently being digitalized in Switzerland.

Two to three times a week, Cristina would set off in her little blue pickup truck and go the 10 kilometers from Ubud to Batuan to rehearse. She often played the role of Panji, the refined prince, which was a speaking role that demanded the use of Kawi or Old Javanese.

She made sure that the younger generation were at the rehearsals; remembering their lines, taking notes and learning moves alongside their older siblings. Continuity and sustainability were all important to her.

The project performers not only perform the gambuh regularly to this day in Bali but also went to Europe to perform in 1999 and 2006; the latter was a trip to perform a version of Hamlet in a collaborative piece with Eugenio Barba -- the noted Italian theater director -- in Denmark where they performed at the actual castle of Hamlet.

The Balinese say that Cristina is now dancing for the Gods. I can imagine her, with her long hennaed hair with shocks of white streaks running through it, her huge grin lighting up the heavens, moving with a precision and intensity that would please all beings.

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