The 21st Natya Kala Conference - a report

This is a little late to be publishing a report on last year's Natya Kala conference, held during December 15-21, 2001, at the Krishna Gana Sabha in Chennai. However, this is such a thorough and detailed report that we think it is never too late! The report is by A Seshan, Economic Consultant in Mumbai, who was formerly Officer-in-Charge of the Department of Economic Analysis and Policy in the Reserve Bank of India. He is a music and dance enthusiast and writer, who attended and took copious notes on all days of the conference.

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December 17

The day's session started with a lecture by Krishnaveni Lakshmanan on "Group choreography innovations of Rukmini Devi". Besides talking on the subject, she also touched on the idiosyncrasies of or Aththai or aunty (Rukmini Devi) in dealing with students which showed the more interesting human side of the late artiste. It is acknowledged by everyone in the field that she could be ranked with great Indian artistes like Uday Shankar for the innovations she introduced in the classical format of dancing. She had an urge to present plays even before she composed dance-dramas, as evidenced by her enactment of Light of Asia and Bheeshma. She danced with smooth, flowing, graceful movements to the accompaniment of instrumental music in an abstract creative form covering the whole stage. In the same drama, she included a folk dance by the fisherfolk and a group dance in the court. Her creativity in group choreography started there and continued till her last production Meera. She was known for using the whole stage forming various patterns. She had no inhibitions about the number of dancers. Choreography was done according to the number of dancers. She could do a programme even with three dancers giving an illusion at the same time that there were many on the stage. The placement of each dancer and coordinated replacement are her unique ideas. Both geometrical and free patterns can be seen in her compositions. Very rigid dance movements as well as very light abstract movements are combined according to the situation and the music.

She choreographed about 25 dance-dramas. The artistes trained by her had to keep pace with her creative flow of ideas and execute them under her direction. The stage décor in her dance-dramas was simple yet effective. She evolved a unique style of her own in presenting dance-dramas, very different from the traditional one.Picturesque groupings with smooth transition from one sequence to another were her specialty. She achieved the maximum effect with minimum aids. She introduced the idea that dancers should walk first and take their respective positions at every stage of the movement while rehearsing for a dance-drama. This helped in avoiding any confusing criss-cross movement or collision.

She had no reservations in using techniques of other styles in her presentations. For example, to depict the lifting of a mountain, she could use the Kathakali movement. Similarly the martial art kalaripayattu was used by her in Meenakshi Vijayam (1975). It was the first time that a martial art was used in a dance-drama. A Kerala expert was brought to Kalakshetra for training the artistes. Among her productions Mahapattabhishekam and Setu Bandanam were popular. A big battalion of the monkey army was involved in building the bridge to Lanka. She gave an optical illusion to that effect with just six dancers.

She mobilised all the talents available for choreographing her dance dramas. For Kutralak Kuravanji she did research with Tamil pandits. The sollukkattu in Hindolam was composed by Dandayuthapani Pillai and the swaras by Veena Krishnamachari. She herself took on the role of Vasantasena. She was also fond of introducing complex tala patterns, like eduppu at quarter akshara . In Andal with six girls participating she depicted all the episodes in Vishnu's life. and incorporated long symmetrical patterns in tisra gati Adi. In Male Mani Vanna (from Andal's Tiruppavai) she could use a dancer to depict the canopy under which Krishna danced. She insisted on lightness in jumping. She used to say, "Jump like a feather". This ensured lightness and agility and the clarity of movements. She had the knack of finding out which dancer was good in performing which adavu and accordingly assigned roles. She never allowed any notebook before the musician and nattuvanar for reference insisting that they should be looking at the dancers.

The videos and other demonstrations were interesting. However, the walking demonstration, referred to earlier , was not done properly due perhaps to lack of rehearsing!

Preethi Athreya, the young petite student of the Dhanajayans, gave another cerebral lecture a la Ann Moradian. She talked on "Making dance: A choreological approach". The word "choreology" means the knowledge and scholarly study of dance, core knowledge in them and about them. The choreological approach regards dance as an embodied art in which making, performing and approaching with intention, impression and interpretation are seen as interdependent processes rather than as distinct and separated roles and responsibilities. Dance is seen as the interlock of various strands such as the body, movement, space, time and sound. The strands have their implications on the synthesis of the idea, the medium and the treatment.

Dance practice is one of embodiment of which consciousness, intention, perception and kinesthesis are aspects. The body's relation to spatiality, the latter's relation to motility and the relevance of theatrical arrangement to the way in which body is constituted in and via the stage space are also relevant to the enquiry. Creation, performance and reception are associated separately with a choreographer, a performer and a member of the audience, respectively. This is an artificial triadic perspective. Choreographers also perform and they can also become their own audience by standing back and looking at their creation. The four perspectives used in choreological studies are experiencing, experimenting, documenting and analysing. Preethi gave an interesting description of the contribution of Rudolph Laban to Eukinetics and Choreutics and the various classifications he adopted for analytical studies of dance. She made a valid point that those principles were not new to Indian classical dancers. Those ideas of effort and line, as well as the tools of symbolic and perpetual knowing, are imparted through such concepts as Rekha, Angasuddha, Saushtubham, Azhuttam, Shraddha, Laya, Lasya, Manodharma, Rasa, etc. Rather than being taught as isolated concepts they are unconsciously developed in the practice of the art.

Many dancers and choreographers have developed their own systems of making movement using the principles of Laban. One among them is William Forsythe, the Director of Ballet Frankfurt, whose work helped her in her own creative process. His improvisation technique is a method of writing dance or inscribing spatial forms in the kinesphere with the body. He takes the line and the curve as basic forms, using Laban's concept of natural zones for the limbs and their superzones. The Laban Center Studios in London were housed in an old Gothic church building which interested her as "space". The high-arched ceiling and wooden spring floors created echoes that she experimented with. She began to test how the architectural form could direct dance movement. Mirror images, shadow play and different viewing perspectives began to interest her. She had also been working with two percussionists who played the Senegalese drum. The music was again a counterpoint to the space she worked in. She decided to make a film to capture the transaction between space, sound and action. She set up digital cameras at various angles to record perspectives that she thought were the most revealing about the choreographic intention. Such issues as where the dance begins and ends, the relationship between sound and space with the former amplifying or diminishing the latter, etc., could be studied.

The video presentation clearly illustrated what Preethi wanted to convey. Her lithe body could execute complex yogasanas, which were consciously incorporated , as she told this writer in reply to his question. It was obvious that she had absorbed the best of the training she had at the Laban Centre, London, where she obtained a Master's degree in Dance Studies. She is a bright rising star on the choreographic horizon.

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