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Journalism of Courage
From cooking breakfast to getting ready for an evening out, Bollywood choreographer Terence Lewis infuses dance and rhythm into everyday quotidian activities. “I can find dance and beauty even in a phone conversation,” says the choreographer of popular dance reality TV show Dance India Dance, over the phone from Mumbai. His first public performance in Delhi, Scrambled Eggs, a dance-meets-theatre routine strings together eight stories and characters from a day at his apartment. It will be the opening act of the 3rd Ignite Festival of Contemporary Dance, which begins this Sunday at the Siri Fort auditorium.
“People have a sense of alienation from contemporary dance as most dance pieces do not engage the larger audience. I am trying to use daily references and explore the larger meaning of life through this dance production,” says Lewis, whose two-hour spectacle shuttles between references to the Book of Genesis and the story of Babel in the Bible to Leonardo da Vinci’s famous interpretation of the Vitruvian Man.
Moving away from life’s great lessons, German choreographer Helena Waldman is collaborating with 12 kathak dancers from Dhaka, in a piece titled Made in Bangladesh, co-choreographed by Vikram Iyengar, which is an exploration on the exploitative practices in garment factories; Manipur-based dancer Surjit collaborates with Singapore dancer Choy Ka Fai and Indonesian artist Rianto in a documentation of the dance practices of South East Asia in a piece titled Soft Machine. “This year’s focus is on South East Asia. Rianto moves from traditional Indonesian dance to modern contemporary in his performance,” says Virkein Dhar, festival director.
Sri Lankan performer Venuri Perrera joins other artistes, Namrata Pamnani and Post Natyam collective, for the staging of her piece titled Traitriot, which looks at a traitor against the backdrop of the Sri Lankan civil war. For the first time, there is a three-day conference on dance. “We wanted to look at the idea of emerging dance forms in the contemporary space and how best to use the body for expression,” says Dhar. A parallel feature to the festival will be street performances by Rahul Goswami and Shreya Kumar, which are reactionary pieces to their immediate public spaces.
The festival will be held at multiple venues from January 11 to 18.
For details, visit: http://www.ignitedancefestival.com
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