Sangeet Natak Aakdemi's Kul Varnika where Commonwealth literature, from the Pacific Islands to Bangladesh and from Nigeria to the U.K., provided inspiration for Indian performing art expression, must be warmly lauded for encouraging artistes to think out of the box. In such inter-cultural journeys, theatre with its openness has an advantage over stylised dance languages.
With her experience in both Kathakali and theatre, it is Maya Rao's interpretation of “Quality Street” based on Nigerian writer Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's work that stole the thunder with incisive humour and sheer ability in capturing locale, energy and linguistic accents of the characters, while bringing home the universality of the story. Mother Nijoku's plans for a fashionable wedding for daughter Sochienne come to naught with the latter's preference for the emotionally significant but decrepit Amarchi country house where she was brought up.
The costume and outfit for the “fat bourgeois dilettante” with swollen hips and cloth hat, the hip swinging African dance movements, and excellent timing in music/sound interventions comprised a prodigious experience in one-woman theatre.
Poignantly capturing the grandeur and indomitable courage of Bola's motherly love, after losing six sons in “Life is sweet at Kumansenu”, authored by that “greatest of African writers” Abioseh Davidson Nicol, was the other one-woman soliloquy in Hindi by Hema Singh.
Among dancers Shagun Butani's effort based on the poem “The Door” by the Western Samoan writer Albert Wendt who settled down in New Zealand, opened new doors to the unlimited possibilities of a form like Seraikella Chhau. The door can mean transience or rootedness, an opening to a world of opportunity or a closure to the world outside. “Inwards and outwards”, “a pulling back or a pushing forward” the door leads to many other doors.
Right at the start two dancers positioned in a plie, with front and back to audience, in the very space between the two flexed knees, suggested a door or gateway. From nayikabhed, and a puppet symbolising closure of one life with death and sorrow to another ready to open out, myriad situations of what a door could signify were brought out, in what was a most intelligently and poetically designed performance. The feel of joy with the face covered in a mask was very muted. Just one intervening sequence at a faster pace as a contrast in what was a very even paced presentation could have provided a counterpoint. But full marks to Shagun for a fine effort!
Anita Ratnam's well rehearsed interpretation of Nigerian poet Christopher Okigbo's poems “Mallie” (Mother), “Polygamous Moon” and “Creation”, with minimal but strong accompanists in Darbuka Siva (multi percussions) and sensitive nattuvangam, told the story of woman's compulsion to fight for space and rights through ravages and exploitation.
ome images, like the African rhythms on the drums, ravaged woman shown with back to the audience, and woman symbolising creation and motherhood were powerful. But excellent raconteur as Anita is, the moral of the unrelated story narration (supposedly a favourite of former South African president Nelson Mandela) — with the daughter screaming for the Mother every time she ran into trouble — remained unclear.
Geeta Chandran's choice of old poetry – Charlotte Bronte's “Evening Solace” based on wrenching sorrow and anguish of loss of a dear one, William Blake's “The Tyger” and John Clare's “First Love”, if treated for themselves in abstraction, without equivalents from the strong cultural memories of our lyrics and myth, could have evoked more of an in depth sub-text, evolving from the otherwise excellently rehearsed rendition with fine music.
The Akademi's designing of “Desh Parv” festival, along with the Cultural Affairs Ministry, showcasing the mind numbing variety of Indian expressions from theatre, dance, music of all genres, too numerous to enumerate, was a 10-hour spectacle each day for 10 days. Watching the very slick Yakshagana presentation “Karthaveeryarjuna” by Sri Idagunji Mahaganapati Yakshagana Mandali Keremane, one wondered about such elegantly stylised expressions coming under the category of ‘folk' art.
Shivananda Hegde as Kaarthaveeryarjuna in the grace and subtlety of his abhinaya capturing the beauty of the forest near the Narmada river while interacting tenderly with the sakhis, and in the mocking “Sikkidiya Daityaraya” gently poking fun at the humbled Ravan himself, in the aesthetic costumes and delightfully varied gaits or gati(s) in different situations, not to speak of the singing in Mohanam and Kamboji of the Bhagavata, left one amazed at the artistic detailing of this enactment. More highpoints from this festival next week!
Published - October 14, 2010 06:05 pm IST
