Ask any practitioner of Contemporary dance if training in classical dance enriches their practise and the answer will most often be in the affirmative. Dancer Aranyani Bhargav and her dance company, Vyuti conducted an experiment recently where they applied this equation in the reverse. Team Vyuti applied aspects such as contact and interaction between dancers to a Bharatanatyam Margam to see how it transforms it. The result was an astonishing product, an organic dialogue between modernity and tradition.
Conceptualised in 2013 by Aranyani, Vyuti Dance Company comprises dancers Aswathy Manoharan, Priya Kaul, Tony Pius, Ashwin George, Bhavana Gowri Archana Nair and Aranyani.
They began the ‘group Margam’ with the alaripu. Standing next to each other with their arms resting on each other’s shoulders, the alaripu was performed by three dancers but looked as if it was performed by one. The dancer in the middle had her hands at the back and performed the alaripu with just her eyes, body and feet. The dancers on either side of her acted as her right and left arms. That they functioned as a single unit on stage was definitely no mean feat.
To a traditional Bharatanatyam connoisseur, the performance certainly looked different but on closer look, one found that the integrity and the vocabulary of the form itself was left untouched and intact. If anything, it was enhanced.
The Jatiswaram was performed without the musical accompaniment of the mridangam. As Priya Purushottam's rendition ofthe jatiswaram in Hamsadhwani played in the background, the dancers used their feet to keep rhythm. What was at display was how the energies of the different dancers were again synchronised to become a cohesive unit. None of the dancers missed a beat or a step despite the lack of an accompaniment.
A dhit-tainda- ta-tai in front, a jump forward, a traditional step in Bharatanatyam, in Vyuti’s style, was interpreted differently, for instance. In her jump forward, a dancer was assisted by a fellow dancer standing behind her, who put her hand at the hip of the dancer in front and propelled the jump — a technique most often seen in contemporary dance.
Then came the thillana and it is here that the bodies of the dancers were at their interactive best.
As one watched Vyuti conclude the performance, the Bharatanatyam Margam, with elements of contact and interaction between dancers, seemed like an obvious and logical consequence for group performances. It seemed like it was always the case with the Margam and not an 'aberration' induced by this team.
In terms of a choreography, Vyuti’s Margam did not deviate from the basic tenets of Bharatanatyam and did not look drastically different either. And perhaps, that was one of its strengths — that the elements that Aranyani’s team introduced blended rather naturally with the traditional format and yet did something that was new and refreshing. After all, if Bharatanatyam can continue to inform Contemporary, who says it cannot be the other way around?
