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 Powerful presentation by Keerthana Ravi - Chandra Anand e-mail: chandra6267@yahoo.co.in Photos: Aswin Vijay November 9, 2024 Keerthana Ravi is a young artiste who wears many hats; performer, teacher, curator, choreographer, actor and always coming with out of box ideas. Hailing from Bangalore, now having made Mumbai her home, she has been very active in the Mumbai performing arts scene. By now she has successfully organised two crowd-funded classical dance festivals with great professional skill. Primarily a student of Guru Padmini Ramachandran (Bangalore), she is presently under mentorship with Rama Vaidyanathan. She premiered her production 'Movements of Resistance' at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural centre, Mumbai on 13th October 2024. This presentation, conceptualised by Keerthana, is a creation comprised of 5 items, a collection of vignettes that celebrate the human spirit's triumph over adversity.  Inquilab Zindabad was an abstract interpretation of freedom from oppression across class, gender, caste and creed. These aspects of subduing the people of weaker society were interpreted to finally rise above with truer beliefs and values. Keerthana demarked the stage into five different areas to project these problems. Only through happening of a revolution will these problems be laid to rest, was the idea brought out through this presentation. This concept was devised with the help of Amith Kumar and danced to the accompaniment of only rhythmic music by Sathish Krishnamurty. 'My story in my voice' was a presentation of the episode of Shoorpanaka, a well-known character from the epic Ramayana, refreshingly seen through a feminist lens. Shoorpanaka is a rakshasi who lives according to her wishes and decides to break norms that has been adopted by humans for living a disciplined life. Her character was interpreted in a new way with feelings and thoughts of women of present times like "without strings attached relationship", "benefits of using aloevera cream for cosmetic change" etc. Exploring the navarasa through Shoorpanaka's character in this episode, Keertana gave a peek into the norms made by the society to suit the male chauvinism, the norms that subjugate women, supress their freedom, and keep them stuck in a life bound by patriarchy. Written, sung and composed by Kannada playwright Karthik Hebbar this piece delineating Shoorpanaka with feelings of a normal woman overwhelmed the audience and made them see how the present life is still very much under the male dominant society. The karuna rasa enacted in the cutting of her nose by Lakshmana, aptly brought out feelings of a violated woman ranging from suicide attempt to trying to come to terms with her fate. 'Shoorpanaka navarasa gadya' was very enthralling, holding rapt attention of the audience. Saalumarada Thimmakka's story was well brought out by Keerthana. An aptly written song by Dr. Himanshu Shrivastava was interpreted by her to show the feeling of depression of the barren lady and how nurturing the trees gave her satisfaction of seeing a child grow. Particularly, the experience from the delineation was more elevating as the trees help change the topography of her village, aiding the whole environment.  Gabricha Pausa - "Damn you the rains'" - was a relationship of pain and sorrow between the rains and the protagonist. It is a story of a woman who curses the rains. An antithesis to the romance and magic of monsoons as normally perceived, she experiences unending woes and hardships that come with the rains. The poem in Marathi is written and composed by Swapnil Chapekar. It speaks of a woman, who as a child waited for rains but only saw the tears in the eyes of her parents whose work of farming was badly affected due to lack of rains. And now when she is grown up, she is troubled by the pouring rains so much as she is unable to go to work, and will have to suffer hunger, all because of the rain again. She only has a feeling of hatred towards the rainy season. Keerthana engagingly brought out the feelings of the woman. The poverty she is surrounded with was very clearly highlighted and the rains adding to her misery was brought out incredibly well. Presentation of Ud Jayega Hans Akela, a poem by Kabir, is quest to seek deeper meaning of life. Interpreting this poem with various analogies, Keerthana showed how the soul though surrounded by family and many other attachments which seem to make living life meaningful, truth is that the soul has come alone and will leave this world alone. A powerful presentation of these concepts proves that art through pathos can be divinely entertaining.  Chandra Anand is a Bharatanatyam artiste and teacher. She has an MA in Bharatanatyam from Tilak Maharashtra Vidyapeeth, and her series on 'Education in spiritual values through Bharatanatyam' is featured in narthaki.com. |
