ONE ASIA, 2014

In 2010, the first ‘ONE ASIA’ event was held in Auroville. It brought together artists and tea masters from various Asian countries to explore and strengthen unity between their cultures, as well as introducing the richness of Asian cultures to Auroville. The second ONE ASIA event took place in Delhi in 2012 and the third, ONE ASIA 2014, was held recently in Taipei, Taiwan.

“Taiwan is a very special place,” says Jyoti, the Aurovilian who founded and organizes the ONE ASIA project, “because it is a kind of repository of classical Chinese culture.” However, from a funding point of view it brought complications. The Taiwanese Ministry of Education did help with printing costs and one of the major National Universities hosted many of the events, but the sensitive nature of Taiwan’s political relationship with China meant that there was no governmental support from other Asian countries. Instead, the event was supported by individuals and organizations like the Foundation for World Education and the Auroville International centres.

The purpose of the ONE ASIA events is to express and strengthen Asian unity through bringing together dancers, artists, musicians, calligraphers and tea masters from Asia. This year they came from Taiwan, Japan, Korea, India and other countries. “One of the differences this time,” says Jyoti, “is that we had a lot more workshops for the public and students of the National University. Another new aspect was the experimentation in the performing arts. For the first week the artists presented their various disciplines, but at the end we invited all the artists to work as one team in a public performance called ‘An offering to Mahasaraswati’.

“This was one of the highlights of the event,” says Isha, Jyoti’s partner, who accompanied him to the event. “They only had a short time to reherse for this, but people who had not known each other a few days before worked together as if they had known each other for many years. It was a fabulous show.”

“When people from different traditions work together, the energy field changes and you feel you are observing something completely new being born,” says Jyoti. “It is very exciting because at that moment we become one being: it is very uniting, and that is contagious.”

Jyoti says it was the more significant because Japanese and Korean artists rarely work together in the field of traditional art. But are the Asian cultures really so different?

Jyoti explains that China today is a conglomerate of very different artistic cultures – the south, for example, is very different from the north – and although Korean art and religion originally had a huge influence on Japanese culture, later they diverged. “The Korean way is more emotionally expressive, more outward, in comparison to the Japanese. In Japanese traditional art, we focus very much upon silence and then through the silence something else emerges. It emerges because we contain rather than express our emotions. The Chinese influence was also very strong upon Japan, particularly during the period that we call the Golden Age, the Tang Dynasty in China. The beauty of the Tang Dynasty was that there was a kind of unity of Asian cultures at that time because there were free exchanges between nations through the Silk road. ONE ASIA very much resonates with the idealism of that time and wants to bring it to a contemporary audience.”

In fact, he feels that a unification of the cultures is happening today worldwide. “However, the driving force today is mostly economic, not spiritual or cultural. Artists have a common understanding that spirituality and culture have to lead the economy and the politics, not the other way round, so we want to put politics and economics back into alignment with spirituality and our deeper cultural values. Personally, I feel this is my dharma.”

Does he feel that the Asian population of Auroville, which is steadily growing, is trying to perform the same task here? “Here it is somewhat different. I think that Asian people as a whole has a tendency to give a higher priority to community life, an aspect I feel is missing in the individualistic Auroville culture of today. If we don’t care for each other, there will be no possibility of individual growth or of the collective evolution of consciousness. We need to give some space to others for them to experience and grow. This is why it is important that more and more people from Asia come to Auroville.”

So how does he see the connection between the ONE ASIA events and Auroville?

“First of all it is a way of letting people hear about Auroville. Among 28 participating artists, five Aurovilians participated in ONE ASIA 2014 and sometimes we had deep conversations with other participants. Artists, in particular, like to hear about Auroville because they feel a resonance with what we are doing here (in fact, quite a number have visited already). Grace did a wonderful workshop and performances. Dharmesh also made a presentation to the architecture department of a university in Taiwan that was really appreciated. Now the architect’s office in Taipei is planning to come to Auroville to visit our architects.

At the same time, it is very good for us Aurovilians who participated to learn more about other cultures because we always bring back new perspectives.”

Jyoti plans to bring ONE ASIA back to Auroville, where it started, in 2018. “One of the elements I really want to develop further is the homage ‘An Offering to Mahasaraswati’, not just because of its unifying effect but also because Mother gave the significance of Mahasaraswati to the International Zone. This is where I would like to hold the event.”

The next ONE ASIA event may be held in Kyoto, Japan, in 2016. Jyoti has already met the Mayor, who is enthusiastic about the idea. Is Jyoti planning any changes in the format or participation? “Even though we had a sponsor from mainland China, artists from the mainland were unable to participate this time because of their schedules. Also, artists from South East Asia and West Asia were not well represented in Taiwan, so I really want to focus on including them next time. It is very important that we have as much diversity as possible because that makes the final unity much stronger.”

A few months before the Taipei event, Jyoti met the famous Indian art director Rajeev Sethi in Delhi. “When he heard about the upcoming ONE ASIA event he was very happy and told me, ‘You are planting the seeds of the Banyan tree. Eventually, everything will become one.’ What he said made absolute sense. Through these ONE ASIA events I feel we are planting something, in our small way, not only for Asia but also for the world.”

For more information see www.oneasiaproject.org.

 Also the Facebook page, search “ONE ASIA project”.