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Odissi (Odia: ଓଡ଼ିଶୀ), also referred to as Orissa in old literature, is a major ancient Indian classical dance that origin in the Hindu temples of Odisha – an eastern coastal state of India.[1][2][3] Odissi, in its history, was performed predominantly by women,[1][4] and expressed religious stories and spirital ideas, particularly of Vaishnavism. Odissi performances have also expressed ideas of other traditions such as those related to Hindu Gods Shiva and Surya, as well as Hindu Goddesses (Shaktism).[5] The theoretical foundations of Odissi trace to the ancient Sanskrit text Natya Shastra, its existence in antiquity evidenced by the dance poses in the sculptures of Odissi Hindu temples,[1][6] and archeological sites related to Hinduism (Sanatana Dharma), Buddhism and Jainism.[7][8][9] It was suppressed under the British Rule.[10][11] The suppression was protested by the Indians, followed by its revival, reconstruction and expansion since India gained independence from the colonial rule.[8]
Odissi is traditionally a dance-drama genre of performance art, where the artist(s) and musicians play out a story, a spiritual message or devotional poem from the Hindu texts, using symbolic costumes,[12] body movement, abhinaya (expressions) and mudras (gestures and sign language) set out in ancient Sanskrit literature.[13] Classical Odia literature & the Gitagovinda set to traditional Odissi music are used for the abhinaya. Odissi is learnt and performed as a composite of basic dance motif called the Bhangas (symmetric body bends, stance). It involves lower (footwork), mid (torso) and upper (hand and head) as three sources of perfecting expression and audience engagement with geometric symmetry and rhythmic musical resonance.[14][15] An Odissi performance repertoire includes invocation, nritta (pure dance), nritya (expressive dance), natya (dance drama) and moksha (dance climax connoting freedom of the soul and spiritual release).[16][17]
Traditional Odissi exists in two major styles, the first perfected by women and focussed on solemn, spiritual temple dance (maharis); the second perfected by boys dressed as girls (gotipuas)[18] which diversified to include athletic and acrobatic moves, and were performed from festive occasions in temples to general folksy entertainment.[6] Modern Odissi productions by Indian artists have presented a diverse range of experimental ideas, culture fusion, themes and plays.[19] Odissi was the only Indian dance form present in Michael Jackson's 1991 hit single Black or White.
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History[edit]
The foundations of Odissi are found in Natya Shastra, the ancient Hindu Sanskrit text of performance arts.[20][21] The basic dance units described in Natyashastra, all 108 of them, are identical to those in Odissi.[21]
Natya Shastra is attributed to the ancient scholar Bharata Muni, and its first complete compilation is dated to between 200 BCE and 200 CE,[22][23] but estimates vary between 500 BCE and 500 CE.[24] The most studied version of the Natya Shastra text consists of about 6000 verses structured into 36 chapters.[22][25] The text, states Natalia Lidova, describes the theory of Tāṇḍava dance (Shiva), the theory of rasa, of bhāva, expression, gestures, acting techniques, basic steps, standing postures – all of which are part of Indian classical dances.[22][26] Dance and performance arts, states this ancient text,[27] are a form of expression of spiritual ideas, virtues and the essence of scriptures.[28] The Natya Shastra refers to four vrittis (methods of expressive delivery) in vogue – Avanti, Dakshinatya, Panchali and Odra-Magadhi; of these, the Odra refers to Odisha.[29]
More direct historical evidence of dance and music as an ancient performance art are found in archaeological sites such as caves and in temple carvings of Bhubaneswar, Konark and Puri.[21][30] The Manchapuri cave in Udayagiri shows carvings of dance and musicians, and this has been dated to the time of Jain king Kharavela in the first or second century BCE. The Hathigumpha inscriptions, also dated to the same ruler, mention music and dance:[29][31]
The musical tradition of Odisha also has ancient roots. Archeologists have reported the discovery of 20-key, carefully shaped polished basalt lithophone in Sankarjang, the highlands of Odisha, which is dated to about 1000 BCE.[34][35]
Medieval era[edit]
The Hindu, Jain and Buddhist archaeological sites in Odisha state, particularly the Assia range of hills show inscriptions and carvings of dances that are dated to the 6th to 9th century CE. Important sites include the Ranigumpha in Udaygiri, and various caves and temples at Lalitgiri, Ratnagiri and Alatgiri sites. The Buddhist icons, for example, are depicted as dancing gods and goddesses, with Haruka, Vajravarahi, and Marichi in Odissi-like postures.[36][37] Historical evidence, states Alexandra Carter, shows that Odissi Maharis (Hindu temple dancers) and dance halls architecture (nata-mandap) were in vogue at least by the 9th century CE.[38]
According to Kapila Vatsyayan, the Kalpasutra of Jainism, in its manuscripts discovered in Gujarat, includes classical Indian dance poses – such as the Samapada, the Tribhangi and the Chuaka of Odissi. This, states Vatsyayan, suggests that Odissi was admired or at least well known in distant parts of India, far from Odisha in the medieval era, to be included in the margins of an important Jain text.[39] However, the Jain manuscripts use the dance poses as decorative art in the margins and cover, but do not describe or discuss the dance. Hindu dance texts such as the Abhinaya Chandrika and Abhinaya Darpana provide a detailed description of the movements of the feet, hands, the standing postures, the movement and the dance repertoire.[40] It includes illustrations of the Karanãs mentioned in NãtyaShãstra.[41] Similarly, the illustrated Hindu text on temple architecture from Odisha, the Shilpaprakãsha, deals with Odia architecture and sculpture, and includes Odissi postures.[42]
Actual sculptures that have survived into the modern era and panel reliefs in Odia temples, dated to be from the 10th to 14th century, show Odissi dance. This is evidenced in Jagannatha temple in Puri, as well as other temples of Vaishnavism, Shaivism, Shaktism and Vedic deities such as Surya (Sun) in Odisha.[5] There are several sculptures of dancers and musicians in Konark Sun Temple and Brahmeswara Temple in Bhubaneswar.[1][6]
The composition of the poetic texts by 8th century Shankaracharya and particularly of divine love inspired Gitagovinda by 12th century Jayadeva influenced the focus and growth of modern Odissi.[43] Odissi was performed in the temples by the dancers called Maharis, who played out these spiritual poems and underlying religious plays, after training and perfecting their art of dance starting from an early age, and who were revered as auspicious to religious services.[5][43]
Mughal and British period[edit]
After 12th-century, Odia temples, monasteries and nearby institutions such as the Puspagiri in eastern Indian subcontinent came under waves of attacks and ransacking by Muslim armies, a turmoil that impacted all arts and eroded the freedoms previously enjoyed by performance artists.[11] The official records of Sultan Firuz Shah Tughlaq's invasion in Odisha (1360–1361 CE), for example, describe the destruction of the Jagannath temple as well as numerous other temples, defacing of dancing statues, and ruining of dance halls.[44] This led to a broad decline in Odissi and other religious arts, but there were some benevolent rulers in this period who supported arts particularly through performances at courts.[11] During the Sultanate and Mughal era of India, the temple dancers were moved to entertain the Sultan's family and courts.[45] They became associated with concubinage to the nobility.[citation needed]
The Odissi dance likely expanded in the 17th century, states Alexandra Carter, under King Ramachandradeva's patronage.[46] This expansion integrated martial arts (akhanda) and athletics into Odissi dance, by engaging boys and youth called Gotipuas, as a means to physically train the young for the military and to resist foreign invasions.[46] According to Ragini Devi, historical evidence suggests that the Gotipuas tradition was known and nurtured in the 14th century, by Raja of Khordha.[47]
During the British Raj, the officials of the colonial government ridiculed the temple traditions, while Christian missionaries launched a sustained attack on the moral outrage of sensuousness of Odissi and other Hindu temple dance arts.[11][48][49] In 1872, a British civil servant named William Hunter watched a performance at the Jagannatha temple in Puri, then wrote, "Indecent ceremonies disgraced the ritual, and dancing girls with rolling eyes put the modest worshipper to the blush...", and then attacked them as idol-worshipping prostitutes who expressed their devotion with "airy gyrations".[50]
Christian missionaries launched the "anti-dance movement" in 1892, to ban all such dance forms.[48] The dancers were frequently stigmatized as prostitutes by Europeans during the colonial era.[51][52] In 1910, the British colonial government in India banned temple dancing,[53] and the dance artists were reduced to abject poverty from the lack of any financial support for performance arts, combined with stereotyping stigma.[46]
Post-independence[edit]
The temple dance ban and the cultural discrimination during the colonial rule marshaled a movement by Hindus to question the stereotypes and to revive the regional arts of India, including Odissi.[48][49][50] Due to these efforts, the classical Indian dances witnessed a period of renaissance and reconstruction, which gained momentum particularly after Indians gained their freedom from colonialism.[54]
Odissi, along with several other major Indian dances gained recognition after efforts by many scholars and performers in the 1950s, particularly by Kavichandra Kalicharan Pattanayak, an Oriya poet, dramatist and researcher. Pattanayak is also credited with naming the dance form as "Odissi".[11][55]
Repertoire[edit]
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Odissi, in the classical and medieval period has been, a team dance founded on Hindu texts.[6] This drama-dance involved women (Maharis) enacting a spiritual poem or a religious story either in the inner sanctum of a Hindu temple, or in the Natamandira attached to the temple.[56] The Odissi performing Maharis combined pure dance with expression, to play out and communicate the underlying text through abhinaya (gestures).[56][57] The performance art evolved to include another aspect, wherein teams of boys – dressed as girls – called Gotipuas expanded the Odissi repertoire, such as by adding acrobatics and athletic moves, and they performed both near the temples and open fairs for general folksy entertainment.[6][46] In the Indian tradition, many of the accomplished gotipuas became the gurus (teachers) in their adulthood.[46] Modern Odissi is a diversified performance art, men have joined the women, and its reconstruction since the 1950s have added new plays and aspects of other Indian dances.
Love is a universal theme and one of the paradigmatic values in Indian religions. This theme is expressed through sensuous love poems and metaphors of sexual union in Krishna-related literature, and as longing eros (Shringara) in its dance arts such as in Odissi, from the early times.[46][58] Hinduism, states Judith Hanna, encourages the artist to "strive to suggest, reveal or re-create the infinite, divine self", and art is considered as "the supreme means of realizing the Universal Being".[59] Physical intimacy is not something considered as a reason for shame, rather considered a form of celebration and worship, where the saint is the lover and the lover is the saint.[60] This aspect of Odissi dancing has been subdued in the modern post-colonial reconstructions, states Alexandra Carter, and the emphasis has expanded to "expressions of personal artistic excellence as ritualized spiritual articulations".[46]
The traditional Odissi repertoire, like all classical Indian dances, includes Nritta (pure dance, solo), Nritya (dance with emotions, solo) and Natya (dramatic dance, group).[61][62] These three performance aspects of Odissi are described and illustrated in the foundational Hindu texts, particularly the Natya Shastra, Abhinaya Darpana and the 16th-century Abhinaya Chandrika by Maheshwara Mahapatra of Odisha.[61][62]
- The Nritta performance is abstract, fast and rhythmic aspect of the dance.[63][62] The viewer is presented with pure movement in Nritta, wherein the emphasis is the beauty in motion, form, speed, range and pattern. This part of the repertoire has no interpretative aspect, no telling of story. It is a technical performance, and aims to engage the senses (prakriti) of the audience.[64]
- The Nritya is slower and expressive aspect of the dance that attempts to communicate feelings, storyline particularly with spiritual themes in Hindu dance traditions.[63][62] In a nritya, the dance-acting expands to include silent expression of words through the sign language of gestures and body motion set to musical notes. This part of a repertoire is more than sensory enjoyment, it aims to engage the emotions and mind of the viewer.[64]
- The Natyam is a play, typically a team performance, but can be acted out by a solo performer where the dancer uses certain standardized body movements to indicate a new character in the underlying story. A Natya incorporates the elements of a Nritya.[61][62]
- The Mokshya is a climatic pure dance of Odissi, aiming to highlight the liberation of soul and serenity in the spiritual.[17]
Odissi dance can be accompanied by both northern Indian (Hindustani) and southern Indian (Carnatic) music, though mainly, recitals are in Odia and Sanskrit language in the Odissi music tradition.[61]
Sequence[edit]
Traditional Odissi repertoire sequence starts with an invocation called Mangalacharana.[16] A shloka (hymn) in praise of a God or Goddess is sung, such as to Jagannath (an avatar of Vishnu), the meaning of which is expressed through dance.[16] Mangalacharana is followed by Pushpanjali (offering of flowers) and Bhumi Pranam (salutation to mother earth).[16] The invocation also includes Trikhandi Pranam or the three-fold salutation – to the Devas (gods), to the Gurus (teachers) and to the Lokas or Rasikas (fellow dancers and audience).[65]
The next sequential step in an Odissi performance is Batu, also known as Battu Nrutya or Sthayee Nrutya or Batuka Bhairava.[16][66] It is a fast pace, pure dance (nritta) performed in the honor of Shiva. There is no song or recitation accompanying this part of the dance, just rhythmic music. This pure dance sequence in Odissi builds up to a Pallavi which is often slow, graceful & lyrical movements of the eyes, neck, torso & feet & slowly builds in a crescendo to climax in a fast tempo at the end.[16][66]
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