Mohiniattam National Conference
17 - 18 December 2011. Chennai

A report by Madhusree

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Photo Credit: Soumyajit

Smt. Bharati Shivaji inaugurated the panel with a note of thanks to Lasyatarangini. In the same way that I had earlier felt Mohiniyattam to be a birth rite to Smith Rajan, now I felt that for Bharathi Shivaji it was a journey from ignorance to a very concrete goal. For Vijayalakhshmi it was continuous experiment and to Neena Prasad it was minute research. Being a science student, it was intriguing, almost funny to the see the unmistakable signs of argument between Vijayalakhshmi and Neena Prasad, the experimenter and the researcher, although both were ardent supporters of introducing new aspects in Mohiniyattam - unlike Smitha Rajan, who repeatedly stated the importance of hard practice and maintaining the purity of the traditional. In a way of course both were correct. One could successfully experiment with a form only after knowing it inside out. On the other hand, the heritage of a classical dance form is so vast and rich, and the means of learning is so restricted, that to reach the point of knowing it inside out, unless one is blessed to be born in a family where that dance form ran in the veins, is equivalent to stagnating oneself as against exploring one's creative abilities. After all there is an age-limit on both physical ability and mental creativity (I am excluding those who are exceptional and have maintained their brilliance till a ripe old age). I loved Katherine for raising her voice for the the individual dancer, claiming that one should always listen to her heart. Even if her creation seemed to be something "crazy" it was her own, something that was not there before; in that accord it should win respect from whoever worshiped creativity. Besides tradition kept changing, as Bharati Shivaji emphasized from her own experience, and the good always stood out beyond criticism and controversy. Neena Prasad, in her level-headed manner resolved a few heated discussions (typical in any conference on any topic under the sky - judging by the general age group of the participants) such as why the famous and established dancers did not put in their efforts to organize interactive sessions among themselves. It sounded fair enough to me as she explained that it was already difficult for the dancers to create, practice, manage their orchestra, teach their students and last but not the least maintain their own "market", thus making it physically impossible for them to arrange such a conference going out of their way, where as it did not stop them from appreciating each other. In reply to Shereen's question about how to propagate Mohiniyattam as a popular art form, all four of them agreed on the point that along with maintaining the quality of this dance form, the only other possible way seemed to be that of the Samavesh - interaction and unity, taking Mohiniyattam beyond mundane sentimentality, competitiveness and unnecessary quality comparisons between different styles. Shruthi Kp kept the panel alive asking many intelligent questions, throughout maintaining the pace of the whole session.

Day 2 - Morning Session:

Next day morning session started with Smt. Vijayalakhshmi's speech on techniques and innovations in Mohiniyattam. While for Smith Rajan Mohiniyattam was a medium through which any emotion could be expressed, for Vijayalakshmi, Mohiniyattam was a gold mine of inner movements and Lasya. Grace, as she claimed, was the main aspect of the techniques of Mohiniyattam and she justified how there had been no considerable amount of experiment on that aspect. For her working with Mohiniyattam, Kaikottikali, Kaleripayattu and other such forms of Kerala was like solving a jig saw puzzle - each such form based on typical circular movements. Her mother and her Guru Bharati Shivaji enriched the vocabulary of movements in Mohiniyattam by introducing a set of exercises called Meisadhakam, a must-practice for the students of their institute - Centre for Mohiniyattam, to make their body fluent enough to receive the real training. The exercises emphasized the characteristic circular movements of the dance form along with its languid swaying like a boat (the Andolika movement) and the continuous flow of energy emanating from the centre of the body of the dancer behind the apparent softness. Vijayalakshmi felt that Beauty and Grace had to be backed by Intelligence and energy respectively. And she absolutely refused to be labeled as a thing of beauty, vulnerable in essence - in short a Mohini, defined by the male-dominated society. That is how she justified her innovative amalgamation of Kaleripayattu with Mohiniyattam in her compositions of Unniarcha or Swan Lake. It was her own personal way of fighting stagnation in Mohiniyattam, to evolve its movements and equally importantly its music. Unfortunately her demonstration was interrupted due to an unforeseen power-cut. It might have been the power cut that was unconsciously getting on everybody's nerve because soon the peaceful discussion broke into an argument regarding Sopana style of music that was traditionally used for Mohiniyattam performances. Blessed by my ignorance at that matter I closed my ears and started jotting down my thoughts.

Dr. Neena Prasad, who was so nice as to consider us worthy enough to read out an academic paper on Thandava element in Mohiniyattam, was definitely in need of a microphone that was temporarily unavailable due to the electrical disaster. It was pitiful to look at the tensed faces of Shereen, the compere of the conference and other organizers. Moreover the strength of audience was considerably larger on that day. Thus it was a particularly difficult task for Neena Prasad, with her already calm and mellow voice, to reach all our ears. The resident crows cawing at the top of their voices and the two kids giggling around the arena (completely justified since it was nothing but sheer torture for them to keep their chirping down for two whole days) were not making it much easier for her. Thandava and Lasya, as she explained drawing quotations from Natyashashtra, were like two colours that could contrast or mingle according to the need of the dancer. It was a very relevant and interesting topic but I shamefully admit of not remembering more than half the theoretical points she raised. What intrigued me was her take on a dance form that was so essentially based on Lasya. Her approach was revolutionary in its own calm but firm way. Unmistakably there was loud protest from the audience (it was in fact easier to make the protest louder as in the mean time power came back and the microphone started working) claiming that incorporating Thandava in Mohiniyattam was almost like committing a blasphemy. It was really impressive to see Neena Prasad explaining in her slow halting way that Thandava did not necessarily mean Urdha-thandava or violent over emphasized movements and expressions. For her it meant using the same circular and curvilinear movements but at the same time covering a lot of inner space and volume. Again, prone as I am to evade arguments, it sounded perfectly fine to me when she described that Thandava had always been present in Mohiniyattam, but without acknowledgment. It seemed otherwise impossible to differentiate between a male character and a female one, or even a female characters like Puthana or Thadaka, which were in essence based on Thandava.

Her theories were justified through the three items she partly performed to emphasize her points. The first item was the beginning of Sankara Srigiri Nadaprabhu. Ironically, it had the same few initial movements performed in Smt. Smitha Rajan's Ashtapadi. A Muzhumandalam with palms held in Namaskaram, formation of a lotus with hands and smearing oneself with Chandana or Bhasma, in Smitha and Neena's presentation respectively. But it was really interesting to note the acute difference in their body language, expression and usage of music, each contributing equally to generate the suitable Rasa. Next was her demonstration of Ajathashatru, immersed in the beauty of Amrapali and her final presentation was on Krishna expressing his love and devotion to Radha. The last two items not only established her theory of presence of masculinity in Mohiniyattam, they clearly distinguished the aberrations while enacting Nayakas of two different genres - the bold and lustful love of the King - the aristocrat and the alpha-male, and the mischievous but subtle love-play of Krishna, with the right touch of femininity in it. Her performances were dazzling, accompanied by a fabulous vocalist Sri Madhavan Nambudiri and Mridangam player Sri Ramesh Babu. In the Q/A session it was mildly surprising to hear so many heated words of protest at her assertion about Thandava, specially after such a prolonged agreement on solidarity; but then it is a fact that arguments give life to a discussion, and I accepted it for its entertainment value and the session ended with a slight hint of pandemonium in the air.

It was time for Smt. Vijayalakhshmi to resume her speech. She showed the videos of four of her recent productions - Unniarcha, Swan Lake, Parayapti and Bhanusingher Padavali. To me music was the strongest points of productions. Vadakkan Pattukal - the ballads of North Malabar, the Kaleripayattu-movements (Thandava?) and the improvization of Mohiniyattam costume, where the traditional skirt was replaced by Dhothi (as in Bharathanatyam), suited one another perfectly in Unniarcha, where the main theme was boldness and bravery of an unconventional woman. She made all of us laugh restating the headline of a news paper after the first show of her production Swan Lake in Delhi in 2005 - "Was Tchaikovsky a Malayali" - the languid and lyrical music matched so beautifully with the movements of Mohiniyattam that was equally languid and lyrical. Specially Santosh Nair, the Swan Prince, was amazingly graceful in his Chhau and Kathakali movements. Parayapti was her tribute to the marginalized women of Bengal, assorting various Bengali folk instruments such as Dhaak and Dhol (used during Durgapuja, the biggest Festival in Bengal) with Madhalam, Edakka and Mridangam of Mohiniyattam's own. Bhanusingher Padavali was her tribute to Tagore, on the eve of his hundred and fiftieth birthday. In Parayapti she made use of the traditional style of wearing Sari of Bengali women on top of her Mohiniyattam costume. In Bhanusingher Padavali her Krishna wore an innovative costume (designed by Momm Ganguly) inspired from Kathakali. The stage-lighting was brilliant, specially in the last production. It was immensely inspiring to see that Mohiniyattam could be taken to such a globalized dimension. However it looked to me that the videos were that of the first-time performances of those productions. With practice and improvements, by now they have undoubtedly achieved the ability to take Mohiniyattam to an altogether different level.

Day 2 - Evening Session:

The concluding session of the series of four talks was a lecture demonstration by my own Guru Kalaimamani Smt. Gopika Varma on her approach to choreography. Married to Prince Marthanda Varma of the Travancore royal family, famous for its patronization and contribution to artistry of Kerala, she has internalized the heritage of a rich and creative sense of art. Mohiniyattam, as she explained, was her prayer and her existence. She began her presentation with the description of a brief background of her introduction to Mohiniyattam. She solely credited her grandmother Smt. Vanaja Nair for her career as a dancer and for having the opportunity to receive training from the legendary Mohiniyattam dancer Guru Kalyanikutty Amma at an early age. Though she received training from many other exponents of Mohiniyattam and Kathakali, it was Kalyanikutty Amma's style of choreography that she incorporated in her own dance in later years. However she had not always been rigid on the classical rules of choreography in Mohiniyattam as she stood firmly for the creative license of an artist, and also as she believed that her dance was first and foremost a very personal tribute to the divine Lord Padmanabha, the driving force behind her ability to choreograph. Motherhood had also triggered the creative urge in her life. In fact I had known from my own experience how motherhood kept coming in various forms in her choreography. As a performer, she claimed herself to be a story-teller, thanking her grandmother for narrating innumerable stories to her and her own voracious reading. She described how each story she found worth choreographing, practically stayed with her day and night and thus helped her to identify herself with the protagonist as well as the other characters. Elaborate Abhinaya being her strongest passion in Mohiniyattam, she always believed in on-stage improvisation while enacting a role. But for performing items based on Adavu, and for maintaining the sense of rhythm in her dance, she knew no other prescription than regular routine of daily practice, and I as her student could vouch for that.
Her presentation consisted of the largest number of dance items and it might have looked more like a performance than a lecture demonstration. But then each speaker had her own free way to express her thoughts and I knew that it was her apathy to words and theories in dance that led to allow her choreography to speak for her. I was familiar with her refusal to be a dance-academician and I could not but suppress a smile at the thought of her weariness when asked to "talk about" her dance. But as she performed parts of few items that she had choreographed, anyone who was eager to read between the lines, should have understood what she wanted to say. She began with Yamuna Kinare, a Bhajan by
Maharaja Swathy Thirunal. It showed her creative way of weaving a whole story out of a few verses. She continued with a Varnam in the praise of Lord Ayyappan, showing her ability to handle multiple characters and Thandava Rasa as needed to depict the characters, and also her recent experiments with various rhythm patterns in Mohiniyattam. Next item was based on Bhama-Kapalam, the story of Sathyabhama, wife of Lord Krishna, blindly possessive and proud of her beauty. The verses were written by poetess Sampreetha Kesavan, her disciple. Before concluding she presented parts of two more Swathy Thirunal pieces - Kuchelopakhyanam and Vishweshwaradarshanam, describing her unique way of narrating and emoting the audience to the point of complete involvement of themselves with the stories. Her rendering of Yamuna Kinare and Visweswaradarshana had never failed to drive me to tears and that day was no exception - and it was rather comforting to see that I was not the only one. She was supported by an accomplished and supportive orchestra - Sri Arun Gopinath at vocal support, Sri Nagarajan at Mridangam, Sri Sunil Kumar at flute and Kumari Sampreetha at Nattuvangam. Her presentation was essentially based on her approach to choreographing solo items in Mohiniyattam. Personally I would have loved to hear a bit about her approach to group choreography as well, myself being part of few of them, but that was all I was destined to receive from her on that day, and there was already too much of energy and too many new ideas in the air of that tiny arena. Keeping up with the general informal atmosphere of the Samavesh, her speech and presentation made the participants contemplate her thoughts and laugh at her jokes, as expected from an experienced performer and story-teller.

I felt as if I just came to the end of a journey, a short one, but a rich one, and an unfinished one. All of us were toiling under the burden of responsibility of knowledge, of using it well and with sincerity, pushing ourselves to the limits of our abilities. The session ended with V. R. Devika's summery and note of thanks to the participants and the speakers. It was almost a relief to hear her prudent suggestion to the participants not to be judgmental about a dancer or her style just because her approach does not appeal to the aesthetic and intellectual senses of oneself. Each style had its own heritage of beauty and logic behind it and the best a student can do is try to learn the subject as well as she can from her Guru, without trying to outsmart her. At the same time, she said, it was absolutely healthy to keep discussing and sharing in a public forum as well as within oneself to constantly improve and nurture one's own creativity level to its best. That would also expand and evolve this ancient dance form, probably removing even its apparent contradiction with the modern way of life.

A week back I attended my first national level conference on dance - Mohiniyattam Samavesh 2011 (17th and 18th December). Having learned classical dance since I was five years old it is a wonder how less I knew about the world of classical dance before 2007, when I came to Chennai for my graduate studies, which is incidentally on a topic as far from dance as possible. Not that I have knowledge enough to boast about it even now, but after experiencing four consecutive Kutcheri seasons in Chennai, I hope to have learned at least the value of seeing more and more performances outside my own clan and judging my dance with a bigger perspective. The Margazhi festival in Chennai gives a dance student ample opportunity to watch the famous and the established as well as the upcoming fellow students and to read excellent dance criticisms, thus supplying enough food for the brain to contemplate one's own abilities and mistakes and even occasionally generating flares of new creative visions. December and January season in Chennai also stands for outstanding conferences on classical dance, bringing Gurus and students from different backgrounds or styles together to share their views, thus saving an individual dancer as well as an individual style from stagnation. Samavesh 2011 organized by Lasyatarangini, a group consisting of a few young Mohiniyattam dancers gathered together through Facebook, the famous social network site, was one such. It was in fact more, a first-time effort of organizing a seminar on Mohiniyattam at a "non-Kerala" venue; a first time venture of inviting four renowned Mohiniyattam exponents as speakers, whose attitude and points of stress as Mohiniyattam dancers are widely diverse; a first-time stake taken up solely by a group of dancers, held together by a single thread of passion and thirst for understanding Mohiniyattam, put in an informal but sincere way. Naturally I was interested to participate.

To start with, Samavesh 2011 was probably not even a conscious dream of Supriya Rajan, co-ordinator of Lasyatarangini in Facebook. Still once conceived, it emerged naturally, as more like-minded dancers and art-lovers joined in and the online discussions started craving for a more concrete form of interaction. It must have inevitably sounded slightly ridiculous, if not preposterous, to many senior and experienced dancers, having an Indian classical dance form discussed in an online social forum. But it was precisely the discussions that stirred Priya Krishnadas, Shruthi Kp, Shereen Saifuddeen, Leena Shashi, Mani G. Marar and many others to encourage Supriya and make this Samavesh possible as a team, as compatriots. What led them to take this challenge up as compatriots was their common urge to realize the dance form that they identify with, but that essentially portrays the archetypal femininity, apparently so distant from their everyday life, hard and competitive, often lonely. An important characteristic of Indian classical dance (and that holds for other Indian classical art forms too) is its lack of enthusiasm, almost a paranoia at modern technology, which stands for open source and free knowledge. The theories of a dance form, passed on strictly from Gurus to selective Shishyas, is almost always seen as a sacred and more importantly secret treasure of that particular style. The fear of contamination in dancers has often led themselves to stagnation, making their dance increasingly unpopular among the next generation, at least to the larger faction of them, for whom it became an activity that rendered intimidation and rejection.

Day 1 - Morning Session:

The first thought that came to my mind on 17th December morning, while sitting at Tagore Hall of Kalakshetra, was how informally it was organized, and I would like to emphasize on that point repeatedly - it was a rare event in classical dance world, where natural informality on the youth's part was not being confused with impertinence. Samavesh started with a brief introduction by V. R. Devika, founder of Aseema Trust, co-organizer of this conference, former dance-critic and well-known patronizer of art on behalf of her trust. The first session was dedicated to screening of a documentary on Shanta Rao, the renowned Mohiniyattam dancer, who passed away in 2007, silently, leaving a league of appreciation and controversy behind her. The screening was preceded by an introductory speech of Sri Ashok Chatterjea. The speech turned out to be rather an (and I am bound to use that word over and over again) informal reminiscence of Sri Chatterjea about Shanta Rao, who was a dear old friend to him. The winter-sun of Chennai kept forming and reforming shadows of leaves gently swaying on the floor of the tiny hall through the closed doors. Through the corner of my eyes they looked like a group of young kids dancing to silent beats of Nattuvangam. The room gradually filled up with young Bharathanatyam students from Kalakshetra, as Sri Chatterjea narrated the story of a rebel in Indian classical dance, in particular Mohiniyattam. Accompanied by Sri Sunil Janah's beautiful black and white photographs of Smt. Rao, Sri Chatterjea portrayed a deep personality behind the apparent reckless and rather proud Shanta Rao. Description of their last meeting shortly before she passed away took place after her mysterious pilgrimage to Kedarnath. It was a heart-rendering situation and she was clearly going through a spiritual and emotional transformation that she was almost afraid to face alone. Finally, the documentary consisting of two short videos was screened. In the first one she was seen to share stage with late Ali Akbar Khan, the world-famous Sarod player in New York, 1955, and the second one was a BBC video called "Shanta's world of Indian Dance".

Frankly, I had a strange feeling about Shanta Rao's style of Mohiniyattam. It is of course a completely personal view, but to me, she looked much more comfortable and beautiful off-stage, as she played with a swan next to a lake in one of those videos. Her broad smile, fearless and frank, made her much more attractive to me than her performance, where she looked stiff and lacked the continuous flow of Mohiniyattam, at least to my novice eyes. I felt that she always aspired for her own creative style to express her emotions all her life and that was what I most respected in her. Being exposed to Mohiniyattam at an early life turned her into a Mohiniyattam dancer. But she saw Mohiniyattam through her own creative contemporary eyes. In her own words, as quoted by Sri Chatterjea, the soul of Mohiniyattam lied in the dancer's eyes, in their mystery and magic - "never to look at, always look within and then look beyond"- an almost mystic viewpoint. May be she achieved her freedom through her Bhamanrithyam. However, fact remains that the name Shanta Rao, an inevitable part of the legend and history of Mohiniyattam, is now fading into oblivion and it was thanks to Samavesh 2011, I got the opportunity to know her a little.

It was lunch break for us and the only reason I had to control the temptation of hanging around the beautiful campus of Kalakhshetra was that the rest of the sessions of Samavesh were to be held at Spaces, on Elliot Beach, Besant Nagar. That meant I had to take a twenty minutes walk carrying my forever unnecessarily heavy bag followed by a quick search for a cheap place to have a bite before the next session started to sustain myself till the evening (interestingly, I have always found my pockets empty during the festival-months by the end of their first weeks - walking for kilometers during Margazhi is considered as a tribute to art for students like us). However once I managed to fill my stomach with a road-side Masala-dosa, I was inclined to take a more cheerful view on life and Spaces was one place in Chennai that was bound to make me feel good, with the reverberation of energy of dance in its air, its greenery, its mild fragrance of the sea and its cats, never allowing me to hold any of them for more than a minute.

Day 1 - Evening Session:

The number of participants seemed astonishingly less. In fact other than the organizers there were only a few - veteran Kathakali dancer Kunhiraman, silent and calm, his wife Katherine, jovial and friendly, Smt. Nanditha Prabhu, dancer and daughter of Kalamandalam Sugandhi and few others whom I did not recognize. It was the first time I was going to see Smt. Smitha Rajan, the only speaker of the afternoon session. Her speech was based on the contribution of her legendary grandmother Kalamandalam Guru Kalyanikutty Amma, "Mother of Mohiniyattam". The speeches were organized at the arena where usually a Kaleripayattu class was held three days a week. The weapons - knives and Dhaals - arranged neatly at one corner of the venue, was initially creating a rather ironic effect, the topic of the conference being an extremely Lasya-based dance form.

She came in wearing a simple Kerala-Sari and a sweet smile. Without much ado she put her spectacles with heavy frames on and started talking about how her grandmother codified Mohiniyattam, giving it a specific structure of a classical form. Till then she looked like a confident school teacher, who knew her subject inside out. Mohiniyattam was her mother tongue. It was her extreme ease with this particular dance form that made her lecture demonstration so elegant. I specially doted on her introduction on Padas and Karanas categorized by her grandmother. In her demonstration of Manduga, Mayura and other Padas and Mrigangi, Salabha and other Karanas, one could easily identify the leaps of a frog, the graceful stride of a peacock, a couple of deer running or a butterfly taking its flight. She continued with describing the strict format and order of dance items in a Mohiniyattam performance and its Ahariyam (the grammar of make-up and dressing oneself for the performance) that her grandmother as well as her mother and her aunt had introduced, later to be accepted partially by Kerala Kalamandalam as a standard. She also briefly talked about a few experiments of her grandmother with both classics such as stories from Mahabharatha and modern literature such as poetry. What I personally felt the most important feature of her talk was the natural beauty of her way of conveying her subject and the absolute neatness of her presentation. It was something more than sound knowledge. It came from living with and breathing in the air of the dance form since the moment of her birth. Kalyanikutty Amma claimed that Mohiniyattam, as a classical form based on Abhinaya, had the ability to handle any emotion to its highest extent; thus the dancer was able to depict any story that she wanted in great details with various improvizations. While performing a few of her grandmother's and her own choreography for us, she made it clear what she had meant by her journey through the three stages of Abhinaya as she enacted a charater - Sameepyam (approaching a character), Saarupyam (understanding a character) and Thadathmiyam (becoming one with the character), each mingling into the next through an emotional osmosis, were visible through her rendering, whether it was the Ashtapadi - Yahi Madhava Yahi Keshava, or dealing with characters from Ramayana, or the legendary Varika Varika Sakhi, or its counter-item that she composed as a reply to her grandmother's choreography. The last two items were in fact sung by herself while performing and it was an eye opener to me what amount of stamina one could hope to accumulate through regular practice.

There were moments when she was tired while singing and dancing at the same time. But she continued, almost humming to herself. Few of the participants were maintaining the rhythm by clapping mildly. It was a slightly chilly afternoon and I could see a patch of sky over my head as I was sitting at a corner of the arena otherwise covered by a roof. I was occasionally looking up, when I could take my eyes off from her expressive face, now shivering in rage, now breaking down in pain and disappointment, now glowing with pleasure or a trance. Each time I would find a lonely kite or a distant plane silently floating through the dull clouds. And it was those moments when I was looking back to her face I was having an almost magical feeling that her dance was a strange dialogue between her and someone else whom she could see, but I could not. To me, that was her Thadathmiyam. It did not matter much to me whether her Abhinaya had shreds of Kathakali, or whether in her personal opinions she supported infiltration of other styles in Mohiniyattam. Those were interesting debates that were raised and discussed and I do not deny their importance. But I preferred to evade them in order to sustain the feeling of fulfillment that I achieved seeing a person to whom, Mohiniyattam was like air and water.

Smitha Rajan's session was followed by a tea-break where I had the opportunity to see Padmasri Smt. Bharati Shivaji and her daughter Smt. Vijayalakhshmi. I had seen their performance in my first year in Chennai, but it gave me a thrill to see them off-stage. I admit that I had to try hard to suppress the urge to tail my Guru Smt. Gopika Varma, who was busy talking to the mother and daughter duo, and present myself as one of her disciples, who is also a "fan" of their many ventures of incorporating music from all over the world into Mohiniyattam. But then I anticipated my stupid grin and the frantic thought at where to place my hands while talking to them in halting sentences, and I dived back to my corner with an easy mind.

The next session was a panel discussion involving Bharati Shivaji, Smitha Rajan, Neena Prasad and Vijayalakhshmi. It was almost four in the evening and the number of participants had decreased to an alarming point. But the Gurus turned out to be extremely sweet about the lack of participation. In fact as Smt. Bharathi Shivaji put it, it was the sincerity of the organizers that mattered and a few interested students were definitely more welcoming than a large number of students, waiting for the program to end - the sooner the better! After all it was rare even for the Gurus of Mohiniyattam to have eager listeners outside their own class and community.