KOCHI: On a sunny day at a metro station in Delhi, a young girl could be seen dancing to the basic moves of bharatnatyam. The dancer, Swathi Gangadharan, a BA graduate in literature and a Malayali, hailing from Kannur, was performing as part of the ‘Bharatnatyam in the Wild’ (BIW) initiative, a project taking the classical art form to the streets.
The idea, a brainchild of twin sisters Aiswariya and Priyanka Kali, who hail from Kolkata and Swathi, was to tell people that these dance forms are not supposed to be restricted to elite audiences, on well-decorated stages and by dancers who only wore full costumes.
Aiswariya says BIW started when her younger sister who was living in Kolkata asked them to forward a few video clips on the bharatnatyam steps because she had a dance exam coming up and wanted to brush up her knowledge. “Since Swathi and another friend Tina were well versed in bharatnatyam, we asked their help. The shots were taken in a classroom without any costume using our camera. When we replayed the shots, we found it to be very aesthetically appealing. We realised that bharatnatyam could still be beautiful without any of the costumes or the makeup. It was a revelation and something we wanted to pursue further,” she said.
Initially, the friends began shooting at safer and smaller locations like Swathi’s house or their college. It was only a bit later, they started venturing out on the streets. Ever since then, Swathi has performed in public places like parks, exhibition halls, and footpaths in places like Delhi, Jaipur and Kolkata.
Breaking conventions
Swathi has been learning bharatnatyam from the age of four. “Just like any child, I was also taught about the conventional dance form, especially how sacred it was. There was this strong dance-drama element about the dance which told only mythological stories. I felt the problem was that this dance form had a vocabulary which was not addressing contemporary or socio-political issues. BIW addresses these issues,” she said. So, how did she feel about going out in the open and performing in front of people randomly? “It was quite difficult. You see, I needed to break the inhibitions that I had. My mom, who is also a bharatnatyam dancer, was not very approving either and felt that performing such a ritualistic classical dance in the streets was demeaning the art form. But later, I was able to convince her and myself,” she said. Swathi performs on the streets using casual wear. “I only use my ghungroos while dancing,” she said.
Public responses
In many of the videos by BIW, you can see many people pass by Swathi without a glance. “This shows how people have become like robots, they are just moving forward fixated on their lives,” says Swathi. Priyanka adds that there have been instances where people have come and questioned their choice of performing such a sacred dance on the streets. “They ask us how we can degrade bharatnatyam to such a local art. This shows how our mindsets have been tuned to accept the fact that such dances can only be performed for a certain type of people,” she said. The trio is currently working on a docu-series where they are studying people’s understanding of bharatnatyam. “At Sarojini Nagar, a well-known market-place in Delhi, we took people’s opinions about performing bharatnatyam and such classical art forms in the streets. We were surprised to learn that the majority had not seen or heard about such an art form. This shows how relevant our project is. We need to bring such dance forms to the common man, especially when the government is so bent upon advertising the form as one of the icons of culture in India,” they said.
Using public spaces
Aiswariya says the idea to use public spaces was to bring such elite dance forms to the public. “It is also part of a social experiment. As women, we tend to become a bit apprehensive about using open spaces. We have fears, especially regarding our safety. We wanted to know how far we could go about exploring this aspect,” she said. Swathi also had to break a lot of inhibitions. “In your bharatnatyam costume, you are a performer on stage, where your only concern is art and the audience’s reception. However, out on the streets, you are not an artist anymore. That becomes insignificant. You want to become invisible. Initially, there was a conflict between the performer and the woman in me,” she said.