There is a burst of light when Neena Prasad opens the door to let me into her creative space. The room is filled with natural light although the sky is a bit overcast. Sliding glass windows open to the greenery outside. It is pretty warm inside on account of the overhead sheets of aluminium. But the polished wooden floor and walls lend the space an innate charm and elegance of its own.
Her photograph in the Mohiniyattam costume holds your attention. So too an imposing statue of Nataraja that has pride of place on a table. A huge mirror on the wall faces the west. A lamp and an agarbatti stand are placed near the statue while a painting of ‘Nrithaganapathi’ is drawn on the wall, just above the name that reads, ‘Bharatanjali Academy of Indian Dances’.
This is more than a dance school for the Mohiniyattam danseuse. It has been only two years since she constructed this space atop her house at Paloor Lane, near Murinjapalam Junction. Until then her dance studio was at Thampuranmukku, where she still conducts dance sessions for students.
“You can call this my lab. And my students are the scapegoats!,” she says with a laugh. She has 50 students. “When I am working on a particular piece, I take my own time. So once I have an idea about how a work or an item should be, I experiment with the steps in this space, in front of this mirror. It is also here that I practise and have my regular yoga sessions. The space is also big enough to hold talks or lectures, which I normally conduct for my students,” says the danseuse. She is planning to get murals done on the walls.
Neena says that her workspace isn’t restricted to this dance floor alone. “The room close to this dance floor, where I have my computer, and my bedroom on the ground floor, where I keep my reference books are also part of my creative space,” says the celebrated dancer and writer. She is currently working on a book in which she is documenting her research of all these years. In between she writes articles on dance for various publications. “I prefer writing at night. As for my dance sessions, there is no fixed timing. Whenever I am in the right frame of mind, I devote that time to dance,” says Neena, who started out by learning Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi, before Mohiniyattam became her passion while “pursuing her PhD”.
An astute performer Neena takes pride in that she could cement her place on the dance circuit with her intelligent but aesthetic approach. Deviating from the conventional style of Mohiniyattam, she found her niche with her thematic productions, technique and approach.
“My life revolves around dance. I am fully occupied with it, be it teaching, performing or working on new productions. I owe it all to the years I spent in Chennai learning Bharatanatyam and Mohiniyattam and the guidance I got from my Mohiniyattam gurus, Kalamandalam Sugandhi and Kalamandalam Kshemavathy. And my creative space is such that it complements my passion. So when I am away from home, I always yearn to come back here,” says Neena, who is now working on a “repertoire-based production”.
(A series that explores the workspaces of creative people in the city and its suburbs)
