Instrument of Illumination

The splendid panoply of Asian arts has a tireless promoter at UMass

Had she lived in her native India a century ago she might have been a temple dancer, one whose perfect body and perfect form were devoted to the performance of sacred dances before the diety in Hindu holy places. In the northern India of 60 years ago, the practice of purdah, the seclusion of women, would have precluded a career in the public eye.

Living and working in Amherst today, Ranjanaa Devi is performer, composer, choreographer, costumer, designer, teacher , impresario --and administrator. As director of the Asian dance and music program at the Fine Arts Center, she brings infusions of Asian cultures to UMass each year through a plethora of concerts, classes, and performances.

Devi wears her many hats with elan. This fine-boned woman from New Delhi seems seldom at rest, impossible to freeze in any one of her multiple roles. See her crossing the campus on a blustery autumn day, wrapped in a cinnabar-colored kameez and shalwar, the flowing pantaloons and blouse of her homeland, her panther-black hair streaming behind her. Blink once, and she's on crowd-control in Southwest's Hampden gallery, tactfully arranging other people's children to allow a quintet of orange-robed Tibetan monks to complete a sacred sand-painting.

See her later on stage in a dance piece of her own creation, depicting a peasant maiden drawing water for an ''untouchable." A quick costume change, and she's a proud goddess staving off a bull amidst a dramatic patter of drumbeats. Look again and she's in a high-school classroom, introducing students to a Chinese dance company performing its "Parade of Dynasties."

UMass at this moment in its history is particularly fortunate to have a person like Devi on its staff. Last fall, applicants to the freshman class included 1,147 students of Asian background -- second only to the number of students of European descent.The figure increases every year, representing both growing numbers of Asian-Americans and students from India, Pakistan, China, Japan, Hong Kong, Singapore, the Philippines, and many other nations. Helping Asian students feel at home, Asian-American students enjoy their connection with the largest continent on earth, and the campus at large appreciate Asian traditions is even more of a stretch than attempting to unite North, South, and Central Americans under a single cultural umbrella. But someone has to try.

Since 1993, Devi has been that someone.That year the Asian dance and music program was established as a department of the Fine Arts Center, joining such prestigious diversity programs as the New World Theatre, Jazz in July, and the Black Musicians Conference. Every year, the program produces two dance extravaganzas -- the Festival of Lights and Namaskar -- giving students enrolled in Devi's two Indian dance courses a chance to show off what they've learned. These are stunning, ambitious shows, wedding the talents of dancers from near and far with those of art students, lighting designers, and even a professor of journalism -- the oratorically imposing Howard Ziff -- who narrates, from high in a soundbooth, the complex legends of Hindu gods and goddesses. Devi is also the founder of the 15-year-old Nataraj Dancers, a performing arts and educational troupe that performs Indian classical dance drama and folk dance all over the world.

For all her organizational efforts on behalf of Asian culture, Devi says she considers herself an artist first, an administrator second. ''I like to think of art as serving people,'' she told us one day this winter, sitting in her office in the Curry Hicks building, a garland of Tibetan prayer flags dancing above her in the morning light. "As artists we serve the soul," she said. "We fill a role people need to think about in their lives. When it's not there, there is a void."

Art has always played a role in Devi's life -- even before she was born. Her parents met and fell in love at a music conference in Kashmir, in northern India. Both were Brahmans, Hindus of the top tier of the caste system. Her father was an engineer with the Indian railway system and classically trained singer. Her mother was a gifted musician who, as a girl growing up in Kashmir, had studied music behind a screen. She was determined that her daughter be less restricted.

Devi, growing up in the city of Delhi, began the study of dance at age three. At age eight she joined a local company that staging massive ballets which --in contrast to the pursuit of the new in Western art--have remained the same for generations. "In the East, they find great joy in seeing a dance performed again and again," says Devi, noting that Asian dancers often train vigorously to play one role their entire careers. The young Ranjanaa soon distinguished herself in the role of Lord Krishna: a heady experience, with people literally collapsing at her feet asking for blessings. To Indian audiences, she explains, the veil between the sacred and the profane may be porous, and "the best artist is the one who merges with the god.''

In India, a well-rounded education includes all of the arts, for all come from the same wellspring of timeless religious stories. Before taking her degrees from the University of Delhi in musicology, Devi considered becoming an illustrator. She first came to the U.S. in 1975 to take part in a world-music program at Clark University. For a decade she divided her time between teaching in the Five Colleges dance program and studying in India with her mentor, the great choreographer Guru Gopinath, who had been a court dancer for Indian royalty in his youth. Devi assisted Gopinath in launching his four- to five-hour ballets; he, in turn, taught her to construct elaborate stage jewelry, authentic right down to the detailing of a crown to represent a specific deity. She still returns to India every other year to replenish her stock of costumes, to record with an orchestra in Delhi, and to have her music notated by composer and vocalist Bankim Sethi.

Proud and accomplished Brahman that she is, Devi has no interest in art as an instrument of privilege, of protection from social concerns. On the contrary, she sees it as an instrument of illumination. Though Asia's star is rising economically, she says, the West is still largely in the dark about Asian cultures. "I want people to know we are not these `exotic beings' from the `Far East,'" she says. "We are part of this culture, and I want people to see that we give something even as we take."