Obit/Tribute - Guru Valmiki Banerjee: A lifetime in dance - Ashish Mohan Khokar

Veteran dancer-choreographer nonagenarian guru Valmiki Banerjee passed away on June 25, 2023 at his home in Delhi at 11.20am. He was 97. He taught nearly every early dancer of Delhi in the 1950s-1970s. He was a pioneer who loved dance and went to Kerala to learn from Guru Gopinath and hailing from Bengal, he taught ballet and tried long and hard to establish Rabindra Natyam, as a classical form. He was possessed with this cause. He tried very hard to get it recognition and acceptance as a 9th classical form but none of the agencies or institutions helped his cause. After 90+ years of work and contribution, sadly he did not get a national award. He leaves behind his gifted dancer-daughter Nupur and son Partha and many students in three generations. His principal disciple and right hand, Nancy Sahu served him like a daughter in his end years.

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Navarasa - A Virtual Dance Festival - Taalam: column by Leela Venkataraman

 

Kathak aesthetics in a virtual festival

Conceived by Ashish Khokar of Attendance, Navarasa-A Virtual Dance Festival under the aegis of Delhi's Habitat Centre, began with a Kathak presentation by Nadam of Bangalore, run by Nandini K Mehta and K. Murali Mohan Kalva - the aesthetics of the performance showing a happy blend of tradition and eclecticism.

From a drop to the ocean
Continuing the off-beat Virtual Festival showing, was Bindu Ru Sindhu in the Odissi style, presented by Gunjan Dance Academy of Odisha's Cuttack, conceptualized by Meera Das who runs the institution. The literary base provided by the poetry of Kedar Mishra, using the water image, is spun round the idea that even the most expansive of entities has its start in the Bindu or infinitesimal dot. 

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Profile - T.A.Rajalakshmi Ammal: A fountain of hereditary repertoire- M.Venkatakrishnan

It was in the year 1989 that I started learning from Thiruvidaimarudur T.A. Rajalakshmi Ammal. After she came back from Calcutta, she was staying in Pattinapakkam, Chennai. Then she moved back to her native place in the early 80’s and that is when she started teaching at Janaranjani Sabha, Kumbakonam. Unfortunately, one day she fell from the bus and had a knee injury. She could barely walk after that and that’s when she decided to teach at her own place in Thiruvidaimarudur. That is when I started learning from her.

There were four of us who did arangetram under her and I was the only boy in that group.

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Article - Kalakshetra administration failed the Founder's vision - VP Dhananjayan

This refers to the timely and explicitly introspected article by Anjana Anand in the Sruti Magazine ('Kalakshetra - Time for introspection,' Point of View column, June 2023 issue), which should be taken seriously by the institution and its administrators. Institutions like Kalakshetra are the pride of the nation, hence the Bharat Sarkar should give them special status and not to apply the rules and regulations applicable to government offices and organisations. This is where Rukmini Devi differed from the Government and rejected the offer to give the institution the status of 'Deemed to be University' in 1963/64.

Under the government appointed administrators, Kalakshetra lost its credibility as an integrated wholesome art institution envisaged by its founder Rukmini Devi and her immediate associates like Sankara Menon and others.

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Book Review - Courting Hindustan - Radhika Rani

Courting Hindustan: The Consuming Passions of Iconic Women Performers of India

Through a series of ten chapters, Gupta carefully re-constructs the nuanced lives of some of the most famous female performing artistes from medieval to modern India. And in doing so, he offers an alternative interpretation that challenges the otherwise prevalent perception of such performers as being the bane of our society and its 'culture'.

Author: Madhur Gupta
Rupa Publications, New Delhi (2023)
Price: INR 295
ISBN: 978-93-5702-103-6

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The many threads of Odishi - Dancing on Air: Column by Kathakali Jana

Sharmila Biswas's Sutra, which has had two shows in Mumbai recently and is going to be staged at GD Birla Sabhagar in Kolkata on June 17, 2023, attempts to trace the history of Odishi dance. Ambitious as the intent may appear, it is possible to see how such a work may have acquired its shape, given the methodology of a historiographer that she has often adopted in creating performances.

In all her work, there is an attempt to look at Odishi not merely as an insider but also with the curiosity and wonder of an outsider who is on a journey of discovery. Her constant quest for inspiration and stimulus has taken her to the rural performative traditions of Odisha. She has looked for community practices in obscure temples and interior villages and emerged with extraordinary treasures. Her learnings have enriched her choreography, in which the songs, music, rhythmic patterns, movement structures and, above all, the essence of rural Orissa - past and present - are integrated into a whole that is much greater than the sum of its parts.

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Anita says...June 2023

 After all the wars are over,

The butterfly will still be beautiful
- Ruskin Bond, author



And so here we are! At the half way mark of the year, heading towards the longest day of 2023 - June 21st - and wondering where the last months went!

May was full of pomp, ceremony and circumstance! A coronation, an inauguration, the end of two major cultural icons (singer Tina Turner and the TV show SUCCESSION), the return of Nrityagram to their beloved New York landmark JOYCE Theatre, several premieres by diaspora dancers, American summer festivals with classical dancers performing in parks and museums- it was a never ending spectacle!

A month away from home gave me a different perspective on dance, our daily endeavours and the increasing disenchantment among diaspora artistes with visiting artistes from India.
This month I choose to focus on some points that swirl around dance and the tone is reflective, sometimes somber and not always celebratory. 

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