When the Taliban militia destroyed the world's two largest standing Buddha statues in the valley of Bamiyan using three tons of explosives, they left behind only rubble and the enormous gaps in the rock. This would become the starting point of a conversation that choreographer Helena Waldmann would initiate – between young Afghans who still struggle in the rut of a fundamentalist history, and young Japanese, who have no faith in a self-chosen future, bound by the oppressive traditions of a rigidly hierarchical society, and take the destruction of the Buddhas in distant Afghanistan personally. Helena Waldmann found an image for the parallels between both generations, for their fight for visibility: burkha and bondage. The burkha is an Afghan gown that covers people, and bondage is a Japanese technique that shackles them. The performance involves two dancers who exult in extremes, a video animation artist and a drummer.
‘Burkha Bondage', will be staged at the Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Concert Hall on December 5 at 7 p.m. Passes are available with Goethe-Institut/Max Mueller Bhavan. For details, call 2833 2343/1314.
