Features: Magazine | Literary Review | Life | Metro Plus | Open Page | Education Plus | Book Review | Business | SciTech | Friday Review | Young World | Property Plus | Quest | Folio |

Old traditions, new attitude

The Attakkalari Centre for Movement Arts is offering a diploma course

PERSONAL INTERPRETATION From an Attakkalari performance

Dancers today have broadened their horizons not just with content, but also with fundamental form. Today's dancers aren't just going by what is written in the Natyashastra and the Gita Govinda or what they learnt in the gurukuls.

Instead, contemporary dance has become more concerned with identity, creative expression and the merging of digital technology with physical expression.

Jayachandran Palazhy, a name synonymous with Indian contemporary dance and the man behind the Attakkalari Centre For Movement Arts, is driven by a passion to spread this idiom. "I started dancing as a teenager. Hence I began to question everything I was learning. Bharatanatyam is a distilled language, perfected over centuries. Though I was fascinated with the style I had a problem with the content. It does not tell my story. Rather it is someone else's story I narrate; someone else's emotions I depict Lord Krishna stealing butter or Radha's love for him, for instance. So I questioned the authenticity of this form. Contemporary dance is not a form but an attitude to dance where the emphasis is on originality," he says.

A reference point

He warms to the theme: "Indian classical dances are like reference libraries where we can research and construct new ways. They form a solid basis for contemporary dancers and help them improve their dance."

Even when it comes to his award-winning choreography, one can see definite traces of Kalari and Bharatanatyam.

Palazhy has set up large dance studios with wooden floors and large mirrors.

Why wooden floors? "That's because studies show that concrete flooring is bad for the heel and the spine. Even in the earlier days, dancers were trained to dance on mud or sand. These days the study of anatomy is important to build healthier dancers."

Training young minds

Jayachandran follows the principle of catching them young and so he and his team have designed an education outreach programme that is supported by the India Foundation for the Arts, where they interact with 14 schools in Bangalore. And for those who take dancing seriously, Attakkalari is starting a Diploma in Movement Arts and Mixed Media this month.

Along with dance and choreography he has included digital arts "as this will help the Indian dancers to be on par with anyone else in the world."

Now, a diploma

The Diploma in Movement Arts and Mixed Media is open to those aged above 16 and "anyone with strength, agility, interest and a wish to broaden their horizon."

The three-year diploma course will cost Rs. 60,000 per annum. Dancers will go through an intensive programme led by teachers from the Indian and international arena.

Some scholarships will also be given, "as we want people from every social strata to have a chance to learn dance". For details, contact 080-22123684 or e-mail

SHILPA SEBASTIAN R.

attakkalari@gmail.com.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail