By Xia Dao

(Clearwisdom.net) (Continued)

Part 1: http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2007/6/4/86415.html

The above discussion on anthropology, religion and philosophy delineates the overall background of divinely-inspired art and reveals its historic significance.

The Divine Performing Arts dancers have revived long-lost traditional Chinese art. Tibetan dance, Mongolian dance and Han dance reflect the cultural connotation of different ethnic groups and characteristics of different forms of life. History has endowed each ethnic group with a unique bearing and body language. Therefore, ethnic dance expresses the most primitive characteristics of humans. For people living in modern society, traditional ethnic dance reveals the beauty of traditional life and demonstrates another state of existence for mankind.

When we discuss the "restoration of traditions," a very difficult and yet constantly recurring topic, we must ascertain that only when the classical spirit manifests with tradition is tradition truly restored, and only when [noble] tradition returns to its once-glorious acme can we truly understand what is the tradition. More often however, what appears before modern people is only a husk, a lifeless specimen of what was once the norm. We can explore and appreciate the utmost significance of tradition only when the classical spirit is brought back to life after all of the abandon and chaos.

This is especially important for China, a country that has suffered major blows to its cultural self-esteem under the impact of Western civilization. Chinese civilization exists as an antithesis to modern Western science and civilization that developed from the 17^th century on. The divinely-inspired culture and belief in "action without intention" shows that ancient Chinese culture takes an entirely different direction from Western civilization.

In divinely-inspired Chinese culture, the view of the universe, such as the "Back and Forth" stated in the Book of Changes, and "The Dao travels on the earth without stopping," said by Laozi, is deeply imbued in the aesthetics of traditional dance. In terms of technique, Chinese dance, with its bearing and movements, arose from ancient Chinese culture. The body rhythms and movements are incomparably unique. Dancing along to a cyclic yet unpredictably variable rhythm, the artists' hand gestures, the turning and coiling of their torsos and the route of their steps all resemble the shape of an ellipse. The dancing reflects the turning and relapse of harmonious and rich rhythm, and every pause signals a new beginning. The beginning and the end of the dances are connected so naturally and seamlessly that it is like a dragon holding its tail in its mouth, cyclic and never-ending. Long silk sleeves, the hallmark of classical Chinese dance costumes, vividly depict the palpable splendor of the endlessly circulated "circle." With two flying arms, the dancers draw numerous revolving and breathing circles like clouds and smoke. Echoing with the landscape painting on the backdrops, the breathtaking and yet intangible rhythm in Chinese dance makes one vividly think, "This dance exists only in heaven."

The divine dances have revived the spirit of ancient Chinese culture. The male dancers slantingly wearing Mongolian gowns, step with magnificence and shake their shoulders, half-threateningly and half-seductively, as they move forward half-squatting at the battle field. The dance has shown the prairie madrigal of Mongolians. Suddenly, the men kneel and bend backwards, their bodies folded and their backs touching the ground with their faces up. Their virility and kinship with the earth is almost frightening. The female dancers bind themselves in Tibetan gowns, lower their necks, and prudently move forward each step on earth, as they throw out snow white flowing silk sleeves and form Tibetan lotus flowers on snow-covered peaks. For a brief time, unfurled before us is the Mongolians' and Tibetans' unique and solemn respect for nature and themselves.

In contrast, the girls of the Dai nationality display a drastically different state of existence with their ever-slim and nimble waists. They bow close to the ground in stable and enduring postures. The Manchurian Court ladies however, above the ground, slowly inch forward with straight backs. Their heightened bodies and regal manner remind us they are not hurrying to gain and work as they enter and exit the stage without any specific purpose or time-line.

Ethnic dances of distinctly different styles unfold before the audience one by one. The dancers portray the original height of civilization once achieved in history. Their bodies manifest the sense of reality and depth, much lacking in modern life, awakening ancient memories. They have gained freedom. Divine Performing Arts has brought back the classical spirit embodied in the natural traditional dances. The programs "Creation," "Dunhuang Dream," and "To the Rightful Place," saturated with religious overtones, remind people of lost art and their sacred ties with divinity.

Divine Performing Arts has brought about an all-round return of human arts. As this civilization has come to its end, again, the dance, as it was the forerunner and has its sacred status to open wisdom from the beginning of human civilization, is now leading us back into the ancient times when heaven, earth and myriad things formed an alliance, and cleansed modern people's deviated state of existence. Divine Performing Arts goes against the trend of modern dances such as the ones with emphasis on the lonely body, distortion, struggle (Martha Graham); straggling, reverse satirizing, imitating in the modern environment (Pina Bausch); the piled human bodies, naked and filled with grief (Sasha Waltz); and the ones dispirited at one time and cheerful at another time, with the function of the body language having much more decoration than spiritual meaning (Cloud Gate). Divine Performing Arts, therefore, is timely improper for the cultural workers closely following modernism or post-modernism.

Herein lies the aesthetically astonishing place of the Divine Performing Arts: In the early 21^st century, characterized by global capitalization and post-modern nihilism, Divine Performing Arts emerged out of the blue and unearthed the ever-forgotten treasure in the ruin of time--the classical spirit of the Middle Kingdom, opposite of Western culture--and presented before the eyes of mankind the unique beauty of ancient Chinese culture. The outpouring, excited response from the audience around the world validates this action's historic significance. The "earthquake" in people's hearts brought about by the unfolded classical aesthetics from Divine Performing Arts can be summed up with the last sentence of Rainer Maria Rilke's poem, "Torso of an Archaic Apollo," "You must change your life." Classicism will forever hold an oracle-like lofty status compared with modern culture.

What the dances of the Divine Performing Arts have brought about is the man, the physical strength and breadth of mind which humans once proudly possessed. Coming back to life is the bold and natural charm of the male, as well as the calm, tenacious, pure and delicate beauty of the female. For modern people accustomed to gradual gender homogeneity, as the result of several revolutions, the classical contrast between tension and gentleness awakens deeply-hidden admiration of the intense male power and of the perseverant, unbending spirit beneath the female's gentility. "So we can live like this"--the dances seem to tell us. It is possible for us to escape the tumultuous confusion of modern life and lead another lifestyle, although the alternative is all too often discarded beside the highway of progress.

Due to its inseparable relationship with the physical body, dance is a yardstick for measuring the vitality of a nation's life. From the Song Dynasty (960-1279) on, dance was incorporated into drama and slowly went into decline. The downward spiral of dance conceals its implicit causal relationship with the Chinese nation's lost struggles. During the Republic of China (1911-1949), the nation was ridiculed as having no dance in China for the declined national influence. The downward spiral after the Tang Dynasty (618-907), the peak of Chinese civilization with thriving martial arts and court dance of supreme elegance, progressed into the Republic of China with no dance and no music. This trend clearly shows the rising and falling of the Chinese race.

In the "Resounding Drums" dance from the Divine Performing Arts, the dancers beat two pairs of drums tied to the front and back of their bodies in wave-like unison, breaking the ridicules about China having no dance. The male dancer dressed in dark purple, and the female leading dancer dressed in green embody the unique strength and beauty of the Han race. The dancers start spinning their robust bodies amid mighty drumbeats bursting with energy--an indication of recovering the Chinese people's body and life.