Guthiyars as bearers and initiators of social and political changes live in a reality that demands them to be more visionary and practical to protect and promote their culture and arts for the days to come. They too are fraught with worries about the lack of resources and expenses to conduct ceremonies and performances throughout the year. NTB must take an important step of reaching out to them with the aim to harness their energies, cultural resources and to address their anxieties as a fundamental gesture to establish cultural tourism in the Valley.
Personally, I believe that tourists, especially the metropolitan visitors who tour Kathmandu Valley, can become regular audiences of Newari dances, plays and musical forms. This beautiful possibility can inject a new life to revive our age-old art forms and motivate performing artists to acquire professionalism in their fields. Custodians of the performance culture of the Valley and NTB need to work in tandem before it is too late. This project (a mega-project, given the economic and political situation of Nepal) demands NTB and the Newar guthiyars sit together and discuss about possibilities of initiating cultural tourism in the Valley. They should work together to track down artists who can invent or create new art forms. A single guthi may not have all the talents who can take up this cudgel of inventing newer dance and musical forms out of a repertoire of traditional skills and craft. NTB can create a network between various guthis and the guthiyars: musicians and dancers on the one hand and hoteliers and travel agents on the other. As a result, local artists will not only get recognition but also motivation to work together to create a stronger artistic force that can herald a phenomenal movement in traditional Newari performing arts. Artists who have always performed during traditional rituals and festivals as part of their community or guthi activities are capable of creating newer dance and musical forms. Moreover, they love doing it as many of them have always been doing it. Therefore, they must be trusted and their miraculous creativity must be honored.
As a theatre person I have come across several talented Newar artists. They have made names for themselves in the academia, professional theaters and their cultural communities. They work with great zeal to revive their age-old performance culture by inventing various dance and drama forms in newer and freer styles.
Benefits of reviving traditional dance, drama and musical forms from traditional rasa for tourists viewing do not end on the stage or in the photographs taken by the tourists. In fact, it will motivate artists to concentrate more on their art and skills, on their offstage activities and life. Thus more time will be utilized to rehearse, contemplate and discuss about their art, culture and professionalism in a very pragmatic manner. Performing artists themselves can become protectors and promoters of their age-old cultural art forms, and develop their cultural as well as professional identities, a crucial matter in the era of globalization. To turn this dream into reality, the NTB needs to allocate ascertain budget for these artists so that they can feel economically secure to invest their time and energy to invent new art forms out of the traditional repertoire. And, this investment can strengthen both performance cultures as well as the cultural tourism enterprises in the Valley. As a theatre person I have come across several talented Newar artists who have created newer or modern dance and musical forms. They have made names for themselves in the academia, professional theaters and their cultural communities. They work with great zeal to revive their age-old performance culture by inventing various dance and drama forms in newer and freer styles. Therefore, they need to be recognized, trusted and supported so that they can help to make this ‘mega-project’ successful. NTB must meet and help these artists as soon as possible. This will also be an important investment to ensure that the local Newar performance as well as urban tourism remain alive and dynamic in the Valley in the days to come.
My research on cultural performances for tourists in Bali (Performing for Tourists: Redefining Performers, Performances and Audiences. New Delhi: DK Printworld, 2010) is based on my finding that there is a beautiful possibility of creating a similar performance culture in Kathmandu. This is how things have worked in Bali, especially in its village called Ubud. When the Indonesian government launched a mega-project of bringing millions of tourists in Bali every year in the early years of the 1970s, it realized the important contribution that the local cultural communities such as desa or banjar (guthi for that matter) to help its project to materialize. By the time I completed my research in Ubud (the end of 2007), there were over forty performing groups staging classical, modern and cotemporary Balinese dance, drama and musical forms for tourists on a regular basis. This culture has intensified Balinese festivals and ceremonies, and importantly, it has motivated individual artists to contemplate on their dance and musical forms. As a result greater number of local children, youths and women are seen learning traditional Balinese dance and musical forms in Ubud on a regular basis.
Those who dream to inculcate cultural tourism in the Kathmandu Valley can learn great many things from Bali. The first and foremost thing that they can learn from the Balinese in this regard is to trust the local artists and realize the important roles that the locally-rooted cultural organizations such as guthis can play in attracting tourists to local cultural sites. As most of the tourists in Kathmandu enjoy visiting cultural sites and locations, they would surely love to view dances and musical performances that have always been staged part of the Valley for centuries. Therefore, NTB being itself a modern and secular metaphor of guthi, can galvanize the efforts of the stakeholders by preserving and working with the talents and the community-leaders at the local levels.
More importantly, let’s not take Nepal Tourism Year 2011 as an exclusive project of the hoteliers, travel agents and bureaucrats only. Much can be achieved from local artists and custodians of the local performance arts to project and uphold the image of a very culturally-rich country.
rijalshiva@gmail.com
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