A different resonance
RUPA SRIKANTH
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The concept was traditional but Anita Ratnam gave it new dimensions.
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EXTENDED IDEAS: Anita Ratnam. Photo: R. Ragu.
Anita Ratnam's has been a long journey in the field of art.
After creating many thematic group choreographies, some within the classical alphabet and some outside, she has gone back to the solo format with her most recent full-length work, "Seven Graces."
A truncated version of this choreography was presented in the latter half of Anita's offering this season entitled "Arya-Tara." Though the first part "Arya" contained familiar sounds and songs, they pulsated with a different resonance.
Thus the selected version of the Lalitha Sahasranamam by Aruna Sairam was a recording done in the crypt of a Benedictine monastery, the Alarippu was an unusual panchagati composition by Hari Krishnan and ghatam Karthick's Ratipatipriya raga tillana, choreographed by N. Srikanth, was a heavily rhythmic, orchestrated piece.
The dynamics of the Arangham Dance Theatre Ensemble in the Alarippu and in the Adi talam tillana worked to provide an exciting visual dimension of precision and geometry.
But it was disturbing to see the casual manner in which the rudiments of the dance style were interpreted, especially in Anita's "Kali Kavuthuvam" and tillana. While it is fine to improvise, the grammar of the classical is sacrosanct and should be treated as such.
The dancers in the group were: Guhendran, Vidyaprabha, Kasturi, Pavitra and Sritika.
But Arya's role was only a take-off point for the abstraction that was to follow, a sop perhaps for the traditional sabha audience.
Its focus on the different forms of Devi and introduction of the ritual mudras within the same context, prepared the ground for extending the same concepts.
Having come out of a workshop experience between choreographers Anita and Hari Krishnan from InDance, Canada, the unabridged "Seven Graces" juxtaposed the myth of the Buddhist Goddess Tara and the rituals associated with her, and with personal experiences.
It was a stark landscape on which they tried to paint, sans any text or props, the seven colours themselves benchmarking different moods or the many faces of the Goddess.
More than anything, it first came across as a personal statement that was difficult to stay with but this de-mystified and condensed version was more identifiable.
While a Sindhu Bhairavi alapana served as a recurrent refrain between the otherwise seamless segments of Buddhist liturgical chants, the theermanams recited by L. Subhasri Ravi and Schubert's "Ave Maria," the intensity of the presentation switched from pensive to expansive to active and finally back to the contemplative.
As an abstraction, it made sense but as a piece of choreography, it was disconnected.
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