ASEAN-India October 2022

 

30 years of ASEAN-India ties celebrated at Udaipur

The 9-day camp included artists from ASEAN countries Indonesia, Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Thailand, Cambodia, Lao PDR, Myanmar, Vietnam and eleven artists from India.

The Minister of State, Ministry of External Affairs Dr. Rajkumar Ranjan Singh, was the chief guest for the closing ceremony. The camp ended on a high note with an exhibition of artworks and a traditional dance performance by eminent Kathak and Odissi dancer Parwati Dutta and promising Sattriya dancer Anwesa Mahanta.

https://thedailyguardian.com/asean-india-ties-celebrated-at-udaipur/ 

SADGAMAYA : Journeying the hues of 'Satya'

 

Kathak solo performance by Parwati Dutta 'Sadgamaya' - seeking to retrace the divine path towards eternal truth.
Dance offering journeying the hues of 'Satya' through the artistic offerings to Gandhiji by 2 great legends:
Raga Gandhi Malhar by Pt Kumar Gandharva
Paintings by S.H. Raza 

SADGAMAYA Live Streaming 

https://fb.me/e/2gFggqDhi

Pay tribute to Mahatma Gandhi by becoming a part of the Solo Kathak performance by Parwati Dutta

Pay tribute to Mahatma Gandhi by becoming a part of the Solo Kathak performance by Parwati Dutta

on Sep 26, 2022

Pay tribute to Mahatma Gandhi by becoming a part of the Solo Kathak performance by Parwati Dutta

Guru Parwati Dutta is director of  Mahagami Gurukul. Mahagami - Mahatama Gandhi Mission is situated in Aurangabad, Maharashtra, India. She is a Kathak and Odissi exponent, guru, academician, choreographer, and intellectual. One of her many hats is taking art education to the rural and poor. This Gandhi Jayanti has planned an online fundraiser for the children of Vidya Aranyam on Oct 2, 2022. The school is her brainchild for the rural poor. 

Please support it wholeheartedly.
 

LIVE Streaming on 2 October 2022 Dance offering based on Raga Gandhi Malhar and S.H. Raza's paintings on Mahatma Gandhi Minimum Contribution: Rs. 300 | 5 USD  UPI mahagami.info@okaxis Sign up to view LIVE Streaming on 2 Oct 

AKALAN Kathak performances July 2022

 

AKALAN Kathak performances July 2022

https://www.lokmattimes.com/aurangabad/artists-enthrall-audience-in-akalan-kathak-performance/

 

Art through Adoor Gopalakrishnan’s eyes

Kunal Ray

MAY 17, 2018 15:38 IST

Filmmaker Adoor Gopalakrishnan

The celebrated filmmaker says the audience watching his films on dance should feel that they are watching a performance on stage

Films can play a significant role in understanding a dance tradition. Every dancer (or perhaps the better ones) is a living archive. They are custodians and repositories of a certain training, legacy, aesthetics and performance tradition. This came through clearly at the recently held festival of films on Indian classical and contemporary dance titled ‘Punaravalokan’ (looking back) held at Mahagami Gurukul in Aurangabad.

Think about Satyajit Ray’s Bala (1976) for instance, which isn’t a great film so to speak but nevertheless documents an important moment in Indian dance history. All the admirers of Kelucharan Mohapatra eventually turn to Kumar Shahani’s Bhavantarana (1991) to be captivated by the maestro’s matchless grace. Film therefore is a museum too. This observation was further corroborated by noted filmmaker and Dadasaheb Phalke award winner, Adoor Gopalakrishnan who was the chief guest at Punaravalokan and also participated in a conversation with the audience after the screening of two of his films at the festival, Kalamandalam Gopi (1999) and Dance of the Enchantress (2007).

Kalamandalam Gopi features legendary Kathakali maestro, Gopi, who was trained at the Kerala Kalamandalam. The film documents all the elements of Kathakali including make-up, costume, music and vividly portrays the training process an aspirant has to undergo. In a much later film, Dance of the Enchantress , Adoor showcases the evolution of Mohiniyattom through parallel stories of a teacher and her pupil. Both films also include some captivating performance footage shot at various locations across Kerala. These films not only serve as an exposition for the uninitiated but also play a major role in archiving dance heritage and some of its foremost practitioners.

In the conversation that followed the film screening, Adoor revealed his affinity for Kathakali. He said, “I started watching Kathakali from my mother’s lap. As a child, I used to be interested in the make-up of the artistes because each type denoted a specific character. Besides, there was drumming and singing. I gradually began to appreciate the importance of lyrics. My mother would explain the stories before the performance because you will not understand the recital without knowing the story.”

However, in his youth, Adoor was drawn to modern theatre. He rediscovered Kathakali much later. He informs, “There was a long gap in between. I slowly went back to follow Kathakali. The first such documentary I made was on a famous guru, Chenganoor Raman Pillai. He was almost 92 when I shot the film. Years later, I made this film on Gopi which captures him at his peak. I also made another film on Guru Ramankutty Nair who was Gopi’s guru. In this process, I realised why Kathakali ought to have been discovered in Kerala and not any other place.

Film on Krishnanattam

Adoor Gopalakrishnan also made a film on Krishnanattam, the precursor to Kathakali. He explains, “Both Krishnanattam and Kathakali have their origins in Koodiyattam which is being performed for the past 2000 years. It is the oldest living theatre in the world. You can sit anywhere in a Koothambalam (temple theatre) and hear the performers during a Koodiyattam performance. Kathakali is more accessible than Koodiyattam. There are a few in Kerala who have seen the full act of a play in Koodiyattam which usually takes between 15-45 days to perform. It survived because it was confined to the Chakyar community in Kerala, who were the custodians of this art form.”

Adoor often says when a Koodiyattam performance begins, everything around it ceases to exist. It was largely owing to the efforts of noted scholar Sudha Gopalakrishnan that Koodiyattam was recognised by the UNESCO as “Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity”. Adoor’s three-hour long documentary on Koodiyattam had the UNESCO team enthralled. He adds, “Koodiyattam artistes were extremely demoralised because there were few opportunities to perform and almost no audience. Kathakali on the contrary witnessed a steady ascent. Kathakali artistes were travelling all over the world and being handsomely paid. UNESCO sent a member of their team to Trivandrum to see my film. After the recognition, things are much better now. Money has been granted to the performers and several revival efforts are already underway. I feel gratified.”

The revered filmmaker insists that the audience watching his films should feel that they are watching a performance on stage. He is not a fan of abstraction in art-based documentaries. Adoor feels that dance films must convey every bit of aesthetics of the form which has also been a perennial quest in these films. His preparation for such projects is also meticulous. The Mohiniyattom documentary took around seven years to make. Adoor read every possible book available on the dance form and also saw some of the earlier films made on the subject. He chose to eschew background commentary and interviews. The focus remained on dance as it should because that perhaps is the origin of all dialogue.

Kunal Ray teaches literary and cultural studies at FLAME University, Pune and regularly writes on art and culture.

As state steps back, culture gets private sector leg up | Ashok Vajpeyi

 

As state steps back, culture gets private sector leg up 

(Shifting Sands of Culture series)

Topics
Business Finance

IANS Last Updated at May 8, 2018 17:06 IST

More than 25 years ago, the Indian government decided to put together a National Policy of Culture in keeping with more than a hundred countries that had such policies. In fact, there was, at that time, a special division in Unesco which had already organised two world conferences on the matter. Here too a national colloquium on culture policy was organised in 1992 in Delhi in which nearly a hundred writers, artists, performers, intellectuals and experts debated a white paper, which, as the Joint Secretary of the Deptartment of Culture, I had prepared.

The move, however, evoked controversy and the main issue was that state could not set a policy for culture which is the business of society as distinct from the state. This issue completely ignored the fact that the National Culture Policy document tried to delineate a policy framework for the cultural institutions and activities such as the Archaeological Survey of India, the three national academies, the National Museum, the NGMA, the National Archives, the National Library, et al, which are publicly funded and are run largely either as adjuncts of the Indian government or as autonomous institutions such as the Lalit Kala Akademi, the Indira Gandhi National Centre of Arts and the Zonal Cultural Centres, among others.

Also, one key element of the National Culture Policy was that the government's expenditure on culture must, over the years, rise to one per cent of the total budget of from a dismal 0.1 per cent.

The National Culture Policy went through a series of consultations, including by a Parliamentary Standing Committee but was nearly forgotten, if not given up, by 1997. Later attempts were made to revise, review and re-present it, but nothing much happened. In the meanwhile, a government is in place which has been very assiduously and relentlessly trying to cut down allocations to cultural organisations and giving them, if at all, only to those whose loyalty to its ideology it could be sure of.

All arts have been reduced to expensive public spectacles and a lot of public money is being wasted on them without them contributing anything to the enhancement of culture, its dynamic creativity or adding to the broader public awareness of culture.

Increasingly, for instance, the three national akademies have reached the brink of utter irrelevance and have almost no truck or dialogue with excellence.

It is in this context that we have to locate the availability of public resources for culture. They are evidently dwindling and, in any case, the State is well set on withdrawing substantially like in the education and other welfare sectors. One of the more dependable sources could have been the corporate sector whose presence on the map of support for culture is rather minimal and quite disappointing.

A recent survey of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiatives shows that quite haltingly the mandated CSR has moved in the sector of culture. There too it is presumably spending no more than maybe two percent of its expenditure on culture. The areas which attract the bulk are health, education and environment. Many major firms have already set up trusts or similar "cultural" organisations and they spend whatever little they do on culture through them.

In most advanced countries culture is considered rightly a civic need and activity and civic agencies such as municipal committees and corporations spend on museums, auditoriums and the like. In this area, the performance of these civic bodies in terms of support for culture is abysmally low and marginal. Sadly and most unfortunately, the State, the civic bodies and the corporate sectors are comrades-in-arm in undermining and neglecting culture.

If in this highly deprived and despairing scenario there is a vibrant cultural climate in the country it is largely due to personal interest, commitment and initiatives of the creative community. Private art galleries, publishers, theatre groups, small non-commercial journals, literary organisations, music circles and sabhas, dancing groups, etc., have kept alive the rich, complex, celebrative but equally interrogative cultural creativity and imagination, investing them with energy and courage, commitment and hard work.

There are some either private or corporate initiatives such as the ITC Sangeet Research Academy Kolkata, the Darpana and Kadamb Ahmedabad, the Raza Foundation, the Cholamandal Artists Group, the Mahagami Aurangabad, etc., which have been supporting various aspects of culture. Sadly they are not many and, in any case, far short of the vast needs of a great civilisation.

(In this concluding article in our Shifting Sands of Culture, Ashok Vajpeyi reflects on the role that state plays, or should play, in promoting cultural activities and institutions. Vajpeyi is a well-known writer in Hindi, and has published over 23 books of poetry, criticism and art. He was awarded the Sahitya Akademi Award in 1994 for his poetry collection, "Kahin Nahin Wahin")

--IANS

vajpeyi/ss/vm

Panchaatmika—A Harmony of Multi-Classical Dance Forms | IIC Diamond Jubilee

 

Volume XXXVI No. 2                                                                        April – May 2022

Panchaatmika—A Harmony of Multi-Classical Dance Forms

IIC DIAMOND JUBILEE CELEBRATIONS 2022: 

Inauguration of the year-long celebrations Welcome by Shri N.N. Vohra, President, 

IIC Talk by Hon’ble Shri Ram Nath Kovind, President of India 

Vote of Thanks by Shri K.N. Shrivastava, Director, IIC 18 April 2022

The evening performance celebrating the beginning of the IIC’s Diamond Jubilee echoed the spirit of the inaugural address by Shri Ram Nath Kovind, President of India, who said that ‘here divergent views are accommodated with intelligent dialogue’. 

Panchaatmika, conceptualised and choreographed by Parvati Dutta of Mahagami Gurukul, was a harmony of multi-classical dance styles. Shiva, comprising the five syllables Na, Ma, Shi, Va, ya, representing the five cosmic elements, Earth, Water, Fire, Vayu and Akash, was artistically and metaphysically envisioned as ‘realising the five-fold universe within oneself’. Contemplated upon through the revelations of oral, textual and performance traditions, involving the five senses, and through a movement tapestry involving the five-fold rhythmic designs through tala (metric) cycles made up of multiples of 3,4,5,7 and 9 units, the work was a harmonious weave uniting the anga-bhasha of five dance styles— Kathak, Odissi, Bharatanatyam, Kuchipudi and Mohiniattam. 

Starting with sonorous notes of Raag Vibhas (from Bhairavi thaat dedicated to Shiva) with two singers and mnemonics recited with tabla, pakhawaj, mardal, edakkya, mridangam and khanjira percussion, set to khanda jati (multiples of five), sensitive choreography right from the opening scene, revealed delightful group patterns with multi-styled dancers, hands held high in Anjali. Through Adi Sankara’s Shiva Panchakshara Stotram ‘Nagendra Haraya’, homage to ashsmeared, blue-throated Shiva, wearing a snake garland, with Mandakini on his head, holding fire and trident in opposite hands. Raga Natabhairavi, evocative of contrary moods, with Udukkai phrases, ushered in dancers holding metal bowls smoking with incense, conveying the idea of void for the sequence on Akash, a canopy of nothingness defying definition, extensive and all pervasive for Satkhandagama and a vacuum for Dhammasangani. Its seven-fold lakshanas, says the Mahabharata, are enshrined in the notes shaddja, rishabha, gandhar, madhyama, Panchama, daivat, nishaadh. The substratum of sound produced within, Akash is set to solfa passages, and Sankeerna Jati (metric cycle of nine units needing a sum of matras), dancers moving in perpendicular formations signifying travelling sound space. Music evoking the difficulty of mapping voids, uses Dhrupad, Kharaj, Sarangi, mnemonics of Buddhist Bowl marking the ‘sama, with percussion instruments duf, Tarpa, morsing. 

The Natya Sastra traces the origin of Jala Vadya to a Shivagana who, with Viswakarma’s help, created a percussion instrument sounding like rain drops falling on Lotus leaves. Commentator Abhinavagupta described Shiva as Jala murti. Set to tisragati (metric cycle of units of three), and Miya Malhar (the monsoon raga), dancers in graceful steps danced to the sonic rhythm of mardal, pakhwaj, Dug, Khol, Ghatam and Tung Tabla. 2 The Mohiniattam dancer’s entry heralded the sequence on bountiful Prithvi (Earth), dark coloured Mother and life bearer, in white garment, to Chatusra Jati (multiples of four), and raga Jaijaivanti, evocative of joy and negativism. Described in the Vishnudharmottar as endowed with the five perceptions: shabda, sparsha, rupa, rasa and gandha, involving the sense organs, the very basis of all art, dancers move, tracing floor space in a square around a square, the geometry symbolising Prithvi, dancing to the sounds of earthy instruments like dhol with sarangi, udukku, mardal and morsang—an expressional whiff conveying five perceptions of touch, smell, hearing, sight and taste. Symbolising dynamism, powerful but invisible, gloriously riding a chariot in unfettered freedom, set to Misra jati (units of seven), is Vayu, breath of the Gods and life germ of the Universe. Sangeet Ratnakar mentions the part Vayu plays in wind instruments like the flute. Melodious flute music plays a contrast of a definitive misra jati chhand as against just notes in a spiralling enchantment of sound space. Rag Marwa and forceful khandajati (units of five) characterises Agni (fire) the vital force dispelling evil, initiated in the nabhi and rising in an upward triangle to activate mind and speech. Prana and Agni unite in creating Naad. Less than fair to such an aesthetic, painstaking dance venture, was the depleted audience following inexplicable delay in ushering the cultural programme post-inauguration, with daylight killing lighting effects. 

LEELA VENKATARAMAN