Kalavaahini
Kalavaahini—as an Arts Trust—was registered on 20 May 2015, with Malavika Sarukkai as the Founder & Managing Trustee. The main purpose of Kalavaahini is to foster excellence in classical dance and the critical heritage of India it represents.
The broader vision of the Trust includes documenting and archiving material in the performing arts and allied subjects; organising seminars of intellectual inquiry where aspects of Indian art—performative or academic—are explored; creating dance productions in collaboration with artists from different disciplines; conducting 'Dance Immersion Programmes'; awarding meritocracy based scholarships to nurture the next generation; and through all this, to keep the intrinsic flow of tradition, vibrant and salient.
In the last two years, Kalavaahini has awarded four fellowships to classical dancers to choreograph work within the classical genre, which is original in concept, creative and intelligent in execution. Under the model of the Dance Immersion Program, the Trust has created a space where renowned artists share their vision, passion and creative process. This programme provides an oasis where dancers with serious intent can imbibe, observe, question and reflect on dance. The Trust also produced Thari - The Loom which was premiered last year and was presented to critical acclaim in Bengaluru, Delhi, Chennai and Mumbai. The concept and choreography of this group production by Malavika Sarukkai, featuring five other dancers, was inspired by the unstitched garment, the sari. This production explored the interplay of the constant and variable in life and art, the eternal and changing—the warp and weft though the shared principles of design, motif and form.
The pursuit of excellence in any serious endeavour demands creative concepts, tenacity, passion and funds to create a stable foundation. The domain of classical art is nourished by the passion and sustained commitment of artists and the philanthropy extended by those who believe in the enduring value of art and the contribution of artists.
Malavika Sarukkai in conversation with Anjana Anand
Thari - the loom
After years as a solo performer, what interested you in group choreography?
Having been a soloist for more than four decades, in the last couple of years I discovered a curiosity in me to work with the dynamics of a group of dancing bodies. It was a challenge. As a solo dancer, who constantly questioned and investigated the form, going into group choreography meant opening new territory.
After witnessing a prolific increase in the quantity of group presentations, I was concerned with how we as dancers could collectively raise the bar to bring in a qualitative difference. I realised it included working on the technique of individual dancers, costume, light design, aesthetics, commentary and overall production values. I wished to explore the possibility of creating a group production which aimed for excellence in all areas intrinsic to ensemble performances. Intelligent group work is not merely about multiplying the number of dancers on stage to make it more appealing to the audience. It is about working with a strong concept and finding the ability of translating this into dance design.
Was it a conscious decision to move away from the narrative as a theme?
The narrative is important and allows an immersion into the world of emotions and characters. Poetry is intrinsic to classical dance and plays an important role in the way I see dance. Yet, after working on the poetic content and its many layers, I found a restlessness in me to extend the boundaries of my dance language. I wondered why the emotion of sringara should be defined only by poetry. Could I not express this primary calling of desire through pure dance? Is it not possible to reconsider angika abhinaya? I asked myself this question about 20 years ago which started me thinking differently and which has since defined my dance.
After several years of dancing the traditional margam I started questioning the content, structure, and context. When presenting the nayika in her myriad moods, there came a time when I wanted to open the window to discover what was beyond. Traditional sringara compositions for me defined a certain construct of response and articulation. I was dissatisfied, as there was a burning desire in me seeking expression. Dance for me is a living language. It is supple, imaginative, vibrant and resilient allowing for personal interpretation and change. I soon ventured into descriptions and comments on nature and environment, narratives which spoke of love, longing and transcendence using metaphors of beauty and depth to speak of a world beyond the everyday. I created in the solo—Thimmakka, Tree Song, Yudhishthira’s Dream, Astham Gatho Ravihi, Sthiti Gati, Aaprachanam - Leave Taking, Samarpanam and several solo thematic productions such as Kashi Yatra, Ganga Nitya Vaahini, Shakti Shaktimaan to name some.
Much of the poetry for these compositions was commissioned as they were specific to my concept and thought process. Intrinsic to my solo compositions and thematic productions is the music concept. I work on this in detail even at the stage of conceptualisation ensuring it is unique, imaginative and refreshing. Poetry is important but is not centrestaged as the only means of communication. Evocation of the concept through abstraction also has an important role to play.
How did the concept of Thari come about?
Spontaneously, right here at home in my courtyard, while I was reading an article by sociologist Aarti Kawlra about the Padma Saliyar, the community of weavers in Tamil Nadu. The article described the making of the unique korvai sari. The pages danced before my eyes and I knew the seed of my new group production was sown. It was a wonderful awakening!
What is your approach to group choreography?
Sharing stage space was a conscious decision I made and my choreography in Thari - The Loom reflects that. In my vision, this concept required teamwork with collective energy. I was keen to be inclusive with a generosity of spirit which I hope the participating dancers felt. It was not about forefronting myself and using the other dancers as a backdrop. Instead, my approach required rigorous training on all fronts as no one in the group was a ‘soloist’. I auditioned dancers in Bengaluru and chose those who were fundamentally sound in the Bharatanatyam technique and could be moulded. To help with the training process I invited Srilatha S to be the Rehearsal Director as she was well versed in dance and particularly my style.
All through the months of rehearsals, there was one refrain the dancers continuously heard: ‘Dance the concept, not just the dance’. I did not want them to be imitative but invest more of themselves in the dance. They had to internalise my approach and bring alive every movement in a way that connected them to the choreography directly.
The dancers who participated in Thari - The Loom were Jyotsna Jagannathan, Shruthipriya R, Aruna B, Adithya PV, Shreema Upadhyaya, Navyashree KN, Nidhaga Karunad BM.
What was the biggest challenge for you as an artist dancing in your own production?
Dancing with a group of dancers alters the spatial energy. This, in turn, impacts my personal dancing energy in space. I needed to recalibrate 50 years of a developed energy presence on stage. This was difficult.
There is a lot of give and take. I had to learn to blend in with the group and execute movements with exactness each time in relation to everyone else. I was only one part of the visual being created by multiple bodies. Now, that is the biggest challenge for a soloist!
The gen-next and millennial dancers are more accustomed to group work as it is part of their trajectory. They are quick at understanding positions and angles and playing with the sequence of adavus. Jyotsna Jagannathan, who is being mentored by me now, was the Production Assistant for Thari – The Loom. She was helpful in reminding me as to where I needed to be more ‘group-oriented’. As for myself, I wanted to dance every rehearsal but at times I had to sit out to take in an objective view. Not dancing, now that was unusual.
What do you mean by mentoring?
Mentoring is a new word in our traditional vocabulary of ‘guru’ and ‘teacher’. Often, I think it is misunderstood in a shallow sense as a trainer of sorts. A person who grooms already well-trained dancers further. An observation I made is regular teaching could often slip into creating clones, but the rigour involved in mentoring requires an alertness to ensure that the individuality of the mentee is primary.
Mentoring is a many-layered word. Committed younger dancers face the pressure of many kinds and I felt the need to fill the role of a mentor which I believe is critical for their personal development. It is challenging as it requires a deep interaction with the mentees, exposing them to the horizontals and verticals in dance for a multi-dimensional growth. Presently Mythili Prakash and Jyotsna Jagannathan are being mentored by me.
Mentoring classes involve in-depth discussions followed by a deconstruction of their choreographies in extensive detail. Training is at many levels of technique, thought process and performance aesthetics. Primarily, it is helping them find their individual strengths and honing their skills towards artistry. The technique is vital and a living breath of dance. To quote Beryl de Zoete “Technique is a garment which both disguises and reveals; disguises the person but reveals his art…” Mentoring requires, on both sides, an investment with trust, passion and a burning desire to go further. This combined investigation requires an inner calling.
Was it difficult working with dancers from different banis?
When I auditioned the dancers in Bengaluru I was mentally prepared that the group selected would be trained in different banis. My aim, was to strive for excellence as an ensemble. Keeping this in mind I worked tirelessly on them conveying the urgency of the concept, which needed translation into dance. For this, technique was paramount and centrestaged in their learning process. The dancers had to push themselves beyond their comfort zone and it was interesting to observe just how they could do raise the bar, if necessary.
Thari proved that our young dancers are capable of more when inspired. Personally, it proved a point that if we as teachers and choreographers demand excellence, the dancers if committed can meet the challenge.
Mediocrity seems to have crept into the Bharatanatyam field. How can we address this?
Primarily by taking responsibility to discriminate as audience and dance fraternity between excellence and mediocrity, sruti and apasruti. Dancing with alignment and harmony is a quality we need to be ruthlessly pursuing. I think we have to relook at the rigour of our training process. Why is it when we think of Kathakali or Koodiyattam, we immediately recognise the need for demanding training? It is ironical that the popularity of Bharatanatyam as an art form has inadvertently watered down the training process, making it something largely pretty and decorative. I ask, is entertainment Bharatanatyam’s only purpose or is there not a more meaningful level to this evolved art form? Reading the biography of T. Balasaraswati by Douglas Knight, and hearing her words of spiritual quest, my faith is affirmed.
Alignment with the tambura sruti in music defines harmony of musician with music. Just as a singer aligns with sruti, the dancer too needs to align with a reference. In dance, harmony with sruti is alignment with Space and Time, the two tamburas of reference without which, dance is flat. While music has an easy external reference point, dance does not, making alignment that much more difficult!
We need to evaluate the teaching process and the pedagogy of this form. When there is quick consumption of dance, there is a tendency to take shortcuts in the teaching and learning process. This is a dangerous trend, because sruti in dance requires an exacting period of training. Failing which, over time, the demand for aesthetics of performance gets diluted. With this non-invested practice, the dancer’s potential to transform becomes less and less visible. Continued in this way, dance becomes skilful but not transformative.
What was the pre-choreography planning stage like?
Once the seed was sown, I let ideas germinate for many months. During this period, an urgent need grew in me to meet with the authentic weavers of the Kanjeevaram sari. I wanted to visit the looms, feel the threads they deftly work with, hear their stories of the loom and sense the environment in which the amazing six yards of intricate beauty and auspiciousness is woven.
The following year, I was happy to have Sumantra Ghosal join me as creative collaborator. Over long discussions constantly bouncing ideas of each other the concept was fine-tuned. This process was useful to sharpen the concept, making it cohesive.
Dealing with an abstract subject and giving it a visual form is a challenging journey. There was no ready narrative or sahitya to fall back on. Each segment in Thari had to be linked to create a flow in the narrative. The seed idea had to develop to suit the visual medium.
It is one thing to articulate a concept and a completely different thing to translate it into the medium of dance. The sections in the production needed to be connected like thread which weaves fabric together. Each scene had to hold on its own but in relationship to what preceded and followed. I think my intellectualisation of those two years was the first step towards choreography.
How did the choreography begin? What was the guiding impulse?
Interestingly with Thari, I started with visualising the last piece which was the sari itself. This movement from the last to the first is unusual for me, but with Thariit was intuitive.
Working on Thari, multiple ideas played in my mind. The possibilities seemed endless but I soon realised the acute need to sift through them acutely to retain what was pertinent. One had to be dispassionate to assess one’s work. I was clear from the start that the production should be taut and not much longer than 75 minutes. Whatever was to be danced must be done in that time frame.
Creating structure without a scaffolding in place is risky. I did not have the safety net of incorporating the theme into a margam structure. Thari by its out-of-the-box concept demanded a refreshing structure. It pushed me to seek out the fundamental energies within adavus, deconstruct their usual patterns and combine them with flow to communicate the concept.
For a concept to stimulate me mentally, the philosophic substratum is critical as the whole structure is built on it. Fundamentally, the concept must hold and provide multiple interpretations. For me, each movement of the bountiful vocabulary of Bharatanatyam has its own texture and when combined dexterously it offers another quality in rhythm and design. Often times, if taken literally, productions can become one-dimensional, offering fact rather than poetry, repetition rather than imagination.
Every choreography is unique and demands attention to detail. I am wary of cliché and conditioned thinking when one is working with tradition. Each choreography is different coaxing me to think afresh and challenging me as I consciously step out of my comfort zone. Risk taking is an essential part of the creative process. Without this edge to my dance I cannot extend the boundaries of Bharatanatyam.
You have performed Thari in many cities in India and abroad. What has been the feedback?
Audiences have nationally and internationally appreciated the level of presentation and performance. Seeing the sari unfold as a metaphor was quite unexpected for the audience and they loved it!
At which point did you start working on the music?
Almost from the beginning when I held the concept in my mind’s eye. This approach afforded me a certain warmth when I discussed the theme with the music composers. I believe strongly in an exchange of ideas with the composers at all levels.
Developing the music is as integral to me as the choreography. Musical texture, kalapramanam, silence, karvai, pacing, sahitya, rhythms—all play an essential role in defining the music for my dance. When I think of dance at one level, the music concept influences my thinking. This thought process in turn shapes my choreography. Dance design and music design are in a constant relationship.
Tell us about the interactions with the different music composers of Thari.
I chose three composers for this work. The last section, Sari, was composed by Prof. C.V. Chandrasekhar whose music sense I greatly admire. Working with him is stimulating as there is a generous sharing of ideas in an environment of friendship and trust.
His experience in Kalakshetra with great Carnatic musicians and exposure to Hindustani music from his years in Varanasi and MS University in Baroda have given him a flexibility to work in both the styles. Our conversations were spontaneous. Images, sounds, experiences flowed into the music concept. He is a true collaborator.
The Warp and Weftpiece was composed by the young and talented Carnatic musician Aditya Prakash from Los Angeles. His music has passion, intelligence, suppleness and spontaneity. This made working with Aditya exciting, as he was willing to explore the theme with me. The final music structure evolved after several discussions and rehearsals.
From the moment I conceived The Loom, the first choreography, I was sure I wanted to dance to the authentic sound of silk and cotton looms. When I conveyed this to Sai Shravanam, we were both in complete agreement as he related to the depth of my concept. To create this piece, we made research trips to Kanchipuram. This sometimes involved Sai sitting directly under the loom and at the feet of the weaver to record the fine sounds of the shuttle slipping from side to side! At times when there was silence one could even hear the tinkle of the thread weights. It was quite an experience!
Sai was excited by this challenge as it involved many stages of creative thinking from rhythm composition, and location sound recording to creative editing. This composition uses only percussion with Sheejith Krishna on the konnakol.
Recording music for a work like this can be quite daunting. How did you prepare for the recording?
Once the music was composed, my musicians learnt it and I worked on the rhythmic structure and choreographed it on myself before the final recording. I find unless I dance the piece with full spirit I cannot establish how it will work. Sometimes, what is in the mind does not translate well into dance unless it is tried out physically. Concepts which are out-of-the-box can be rather daunting as there is no established mode to fall back on. One has to be cautious, intelligent and creative. It is very demanding. Kalapramanam is critical to my work. Each composition has a particular kalapramanam best suited to it. The challenge is to find it!
How important is it to have a creative collaborator when you are choreographing the production?
I think it adds tremendous value to the production. When choreographing and performing, we are at times too close to see the big picture. Sumantra Ghosal came in with a fresh mind and perspective. Over our several discussions I had to validate each sequence to him and this in turn gave me clarity. Editing thoughts and images is critical for excellence and this is something I firmly believe in even if I have to be ruthless when it comes to my choreography.
What were some of his contributions to Thari?
As mentioned earlier, his collaboration involved a lot of discussion on the topic which gave me lucidity when designing the concept and choreography. Sumantra wrote poems for this event, which were concept-centric. This turn of events was organic, and not planned. It grew as a natural part of our discussions. He participated in all the rehearsals questioning my purpose and making insightful comments. I needed this interrogation to be a part of the creative process. It was extremely useful.
Sandhya Raman did the costume design for the production. What inputs did you give her?
I wanted classicism to be the driving force for the whole design. I was particular that we did not use synthetic fabric, but only silk, although it was an expensive choice! The golden yellow colour of the initial costumes were her choice and I think it worked very well. Further, there were discussions via skype on the details of the design and accessories and its appropriateness.
At which point did you involve Gyan Dev Singh, your lighting designer?
Initially, I shared the concept with Gyan Dev Singh to gauge his response to this work. Even at our first meeting there was excitement, as the creative field was open. This fuelled more interactions with his watching rehearsals for almost three months before the premiere as I wanted the production to be organic in as many ways as possible. I was amazed to see how an abstract concept was transformed with his sensitive expertise.
How do you manage the intricate light set up needed at each venue?
Productions, like Thari - The Loom require a detailed setup and come with their demands. Ideally, we require a 2-day tech setup to ensure we get the standard of excellence and coordination required. The detailed technical run through is a rehearsal for light and sound cues, dancers positions on stage, sound balance, light intensity and the overall presentation. I have noticed that when dancers are familiar with stage space, they dance better, giving more of themselves. In this way, when the whole team is in sync, then dance can be taken to the next level. I was fortunate that the sponsors, who believed this production was a validation of classical dance, agreed to the terms for presentation.
Would you say that Thari reflects the next stage in your long journey in dance?
Definitely. It has opened up a new chapter in my life. This is my first full length group work. I had a vision and it is very satisfying to see it take shape. Thari opened up many new facets for me. One fact came home to me clearly again and again. Productions of this type require funding and philanthropy. Classical dance must be nurtured by the informed, it is a joint responsibility of the artist and the patron.
The language of classical Bharatanatyam has the ability to move to the next level of presentation making it resonate with wider audiences; attention to detail makes for excellence; perseverance and passion fuel the process of sadhana. Classical Bharatanatyam is our valued heritage.
When on performance tours or on personal travel abroad, I make it a point to attend as many international programmes as possible. All the best productions have one thing in common—excellence at every level—from concept to final presentation. The creative process involves time, with an investment of spirit, fierce determination and dedication. There are no short cuts.
