KOCHI: She dances with grace showing what bharatanatyam is all about. She handles the extremely elegant dance form with finesse and fervour leaving her audience spellbound. Kirti Ramgopal says she fell in love with dance at the age of 7 when she saw her teacher’s daughter performing on stage. Once back home she started performing in front of the mirror, emulating the crisp movements of bharatanatyam.
Her parents found her a guru immediately and under the guidance of Padmini Ramachandran she started her artistic trip. In the city for a performance organised by Dharani, the danseuse says even after two decades devoted to the dance form and performing on a number of stages in India and abroad, she is still deeply in love with her only passion - bharatanatyam.
Though she has versed herself in kathak and kuchipudi, Kirti feels that bharatanatyam is her forte. “Bharatanatyam as a dance form is very extensive and so far no one has explored its possibilities completely. There is so much to learn and explore and you have to stick to a particular dance form if you want to do full justice to it,” she says. Kirti who gave her solo debut at the age of nine believes a lifetime is not enough to master all the nuances of the dance form. “You can always experiment and improvise with the technical part of the dance form provided you adhere to the traditional style and pattern. For the past two decades I have been learning bharatanatyam. I regularly fine tune my movements at home and make it a point to watch all possible recitals,” she says. She also has an impressive line of teachers including Priyadarshini Govind, A Lakshman and Bragha Bessell who helped her with the intricacies of the dance form. But her addiction to the art form didn’t keep Kirti from her formal education.
After her B Com and MBA she joined IGate Global Solutions as a recruitment associate. But a true artist like Kirti couldn’t stick to the corporate world for long. “I quit a corporate career to pursue my passion and I have no regrets. I had the complete support of my family,” she says.
She transformed her passion into her profession and very soon started giving recitals all over. In 2004 she joined Chitralekha Dance Company in the UK and performed at Birmingham Arts Festival. Then followed shorts trysts with Sampradaya Dance Creations in Canada, and Rangoli Dance Company and Nadam Dance Company in USA. Kirti feels that unlike in India, in foreign countries dance is looked upon very clearly as a profession. “There is proper scheduling for choreography, practice and rehearsals. Every movement is videotaped making it possible to analyse it later. Though the scope is higher there, in terms of talent we are much ahead of the west,” she says.
Though she prefers traditional and rare compositions for solo recitals she has no qualms experimenting themewise.
“In the UK one performance was based on the element carbon, a completely scientific one. But it was done totally in tune with the conventional norms of classical dance. I performed with in the framework of Bharthanatyam since going for a totally alien technique could mash the totality of the recital. While at Canada she presented the ‘dashavathram’ within bharathanatyam format impressing crowds of foreign audience.
Recognition came naturally in her dancing career and she has a string of laurels to her credit. The ‘Narada Gana Sabha Talent Promotion Award’ from the Narada Gana Sabha, Chennai, The ‘Upcoming artist’ - Karnataka’s best art and culture award, from the ESSEL GROUP and ZEE Kannada, ‘Sangitya award’, from the Sangitya Aasthana and ‘Singaramani’ title from the Sur Singar Samsad, Mumbai are a few to name Now busy with a tight schedule, Kirti plans to open her own dance institute after a while. “Right now I want to travel extensively giving more and more recitals. By the end of November I will be in the Gulf to perform in the Surya Festival and I am keeping my fingers crossed for that,” she smiles.
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