“Why do people migrate? What prompts individuals to leave circumstances and familiarity and embrace something completely unknown and new,” asks Jayachandran Palazhy, founder and artistic director of Bengaluru-based Attakkalari Centre for Movement Arts. It was these questions that inspired him to create Bhinna Vinyasa , an exploration of the notion of migration not as a physical move, but as a metaphysical journey.
Th title, he says, can be roughly translated as “multiple assemblages”. He adds, “We were looking for the kind of internal changes that happen to somebody. How, when the environment they live in changes, they in turn, change themselves. This led to the notion of ‘What is belonging?’ And so, related images in artistry and literature were incorporated.” Palazhy collaborated with Italian digital artist Luca Brinchi and Martin Lutz, a German composer, along with several Indian Carnatic musicians, to create “a one-of-its-kind soundscape and interactive visual”. The hour-long performance features six dancers, visual projections and a very immersive feel with plenty of evocative movements.
He explains, “We also explore morphogenesis, where we not only see the world from a human perspective, but also from a material’s point of view, like a table or tree. And though we have incorporated Indian movements like kalaripayattu and Bharatanatyam, the piece is very contemporary. There are much more athletic movements as well.”
Centre stage
Coming back to the core theme of the show, Palazhy says that they also look at why humans want to be at the centre of everything and not the periphery. “It is very relevant in the times we live in,” he muses. It is an abstract exploration of the pictorial and musical language. While this might not be typical Margazhi fare, he says, “It is a time when people can experience a broad spectrum of performances; we would like to expand that spectrum more.”
Attakkalari, a premier organisation for contemporary dance has collaborated with the Fondazione Fabbrica Europa for this production. It is also supported by the Indian Ministry of Culture, Goethe Institutand the Royal Norwegian Embassy. These associations took the show to Italy, right after its premiere in Bengaluru a couple of months ago.
They subsequently performed in China, and are travelling to the first Theatre Olympics in 2018 and a tour of the rest of Europe and Canada.
Today as part of the Natya Darshan conference. From 6.30 pm at Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan. Tickets on eventjini.com at ₹500.
