“M y statement to this kind of cultural bureaucracy has been I exist in spite of you.” Chandralekha, the late contemporary dancer and choreographer, looks at the audience straight in the eye from the screen, as she talks about her conflicting relationship with the classical arts.
The audience got a flavour of the dancer at ‘Remembering Chandralekha’, a session moderated by cultural commentator, professor and her close associate Sadanand Menon, poet Tishani Doshi and Sashi Kumar, founder and chairman of the Media Development Foundation and Asian College of Journalism.
The video was an excerpt from the television programme Tana Bana , produced by Kumar when he was working with PTI-TV in the early ‘90s. Kumar went on to work with her in his film Kaya Taran , set during the anti-Sikh riots. The film used the dancer’s choreography for a crucial sequence. Kumar said, “One of the greatest things about Chandra was that she redefined dance, in all its sensuousness and spirituality, which was germane to our film at this juncture.” He also added that even though she was formidable, she could also be meltingly warm. “And, Elliot’s Beach, where Sadanand still lives, is a touchstone for people with doubts, worries and questions about life to come and go back transformed.”
Doshi, who has performed Chandralekha’s Sharira for the last 15 years, says meeting the dancer was one of those moments when she knew her life was about to change. “When I met her, I was not a trained dancer. She was excited by the idea that I wanted to be a poet, as she was interested in dialogue across arts. She invited me to go on an adventure with her.”
During the interactive session, a member of the audience questioned her conflicting relationship with the classical arts. Menon clarified: “She was a great admirer of the classic forms. She was trained in it, and even while she was moving away from it, she wanted to ask questions from within. She said, ‘We must modernise, but modernise on our own terms’. This was not understood by the classical dance community, but very well by the classical music community. Some of her partners in crime were musicians such as B. Krishnamurthy and the Gundecha Brothers, who worked with her for the last production. She understood the weight of the classical arts, but also their potential to instigate change. But, the resistance of the classical dance community is a different story.”
