Dr. Janaki Rangarajan in Samah: Dance of Mystic Poetry

Photos of Dr. Janaki Rangarajan in Samah: Dance of Mystic Poetry, by Srinivasan Govindarajan.

Srilatha Singh, of ChitraKaavya Dance, has a passion for presenting high quality Bharatanatyam to Salt Lake City audiences. I have had the pleasure of being an audience member for some of these performances: previously, for Renjith and Vijna performance, Samarpanam, in the fall of 2017, and, now recently, for Dr. Janaki Rangarajan performance of Samah: Dance of Mystic Poetry at the Jeanne Wagner Theatre.

I was also involved when Ragamala Dance Company performed at Kingsbury Hall in 2016; Singh, Raksha Karpoor, Liz Stich, and I performed a piece that was a collaboration of modern dance and Bharatanatyam to open the show. I preface with all of this to say that I have had exposure within this cultural art form, but am in no way well-versed in its nuance. I left Samah with a desire to understand more from the perspective of someone that was more well-versed. Thankfully, Singh and I were able to meet and the following are highlights from our conversation.

Bharatanatyam is an ancient South Indian dance form that was traditionally done as a solo by women in Hindu temples for elite, extremely select, and primarily male audiences. There was much conflict over its existence during British colonial rule; many classical Indian dance forms were ridiculed and discouraged. An “anti-dance movement” arose from this conflict, which accused dance of being a form of prostitution, and culminated in the British government banning Hindu temple dancing altogether in 1910.

When Rukmini Devi Arundale helped to revive Bharatanatyam in the 20th century, it was both taken out of the temples and relieved of any sensuality and sexuality, arguably in an attempt to gain traction and shed its former, alleged connection with prostitution. One of the many things that Singh finds so profound in Rangarajan’s dancing is that, while most contemporary Bharatanatyam dancers continue the mainstream tradition of keeping their hips and pelvis centered, Rangarajan has also been trained in the movement vocabulary called Karana, as reconstructed by her guru, Dr. Padma Subramaniam, as her life’s work. Karana allows the hip to be off-center in sculpturesque angles. With this subtle change, dancers re-integrate the sensual origins of the form, and Singh views Rangarajan’s personal interpretation as skillfully towing the line of adding sensuality without crossing over into the vulgar.

I was not fully aware of this history, or of this deliberate attempt by Rangarajan, but I did gather the effects just by watching her perform. I interpreted her moving body as a full-bodied and multi-dimensional woman, aware of her sensuality and sexual power, but also interested the portrayal of other aspects of the human (or divine) experience. One portrayal did not take precedence over the other. She was simultaneously euphoric, devoted, devastated, sublime, and ordinary. These states of being were housed and manifested in her flesh-and-bone body - a body that she was able to transcend while fiercely staking claim to it.

Singh and I also discussed Bharatanatyam moving forward, and how Singh thinks the form could possibly evolve to gain wider audiences (and also, what will remain constant in the form without compromise). As I watched Rangarajan’s performance, I was surprised at the sheer length of it. As a solo performer, she was onstage for just under two hours, interpreted five different poems, and spoke in between each one, with minimal rest backstage throughout. I can’t imagine the stamina, both physical and mental, that was necessary.

Consequently, the viewing experience also asks a certain stamina of the audience. I found beauty in settling into a lengthy solo performance, a respite from the often scattered and short attention spans littered with sound bytes and social media quips. But, I wondered how this functioned with mass audiences, especially those that are predominantly non-Indian.

While I gleaned much from Rangarajan’s storytelling, Bharatanatyam is essentially a form of sign language, the dancers telling plot-based stories familiar to those raised in the tradition. Immediately accessible to me were her virtuosic dancing, the rhythms, the specificity of her arms moving with her legs, and the layer of choreography that was her face and eyes, but I did not know the literal meanings of many gestures, nor did I have access to the music (sung or spoken in a variety of languages, including Tamil, Kannada, Persian, Kashmiri, Punjabi, Hindi, Maithili, and Sanskrit) in the way that Singh does.

Will this art form experience a "Balanchine moment," in which the plot is forsaken for a non-literal musical interpretation? Could it even go a step forward, à la Merce Cunningham, and divorce itself from the music to see what remains of an abstracted body moving through space? Singh cannot imagine this happening, as emotion and storytelling are at the core of why the dancers move to begin with. This idea was highlighted in our collaboration in 2017: Stich and I would explain our movement choices in terms of spatial arrangement and internal impulse motivation (i.e., doing what “feels” right), while Karpoor and Singh would respond with what the music was saying and how their movements directly corresponded.   

Should somethings remain unchallenged? Should we always be jabbing at tradition with innovation? Would anything worthwhile be left if we pushed and pulled at the rich tradition of Bharatanatyam? These were my own questions, though I’m not sure Singh felt my angst within my probes - which makes sense. I am looking through the lens of modern dance, a movement tradition that was born in the 1900s through the rejection of traditions that came before it, and then continued, and still continues, to turn itself inside and out each decade. We dance to the music, then alongside it, then against it, and sometimes without it… and while I find this interesting, I cannot say modern dance’s exploratory nature has gained it mass appeal as a form.

Instead of these questions, Singh wonders if it would be advantageous to educate audience members more about Bharatanatyam prior to a performance. Each show she has presented has maintained a nice balance of speaking before the performance to welcome but also to enlighten the audience about what they will see. Does there need to be more explanation in order for wider audiences to walk away feeling fulfilled? In the case of Rangarajan’s performance, my response was, “No.” Though I could not historically or academically detail all that occurred, I was transported nonetheless. Rangarajan wove the history of her own body with questions and affirmations of love, despair, and joy with a commitment that I have hardly experienced before. I was left wanting to engage more with what I experienced at Samah: Dance of Mystic Poetry- an indication that art did what it should.

Erica Womack is a Salt Lake based choreographer. She teaches at SLCC and regularly contributes to loveDANCEmore.

Ballet West: National Choreographic Festival, Program A

When Ballet West’s Artistic Director Adam Sklute welcomed the audience to the second annual National Choreographic Festival last night, there was tangible excitement in the auditorium: not only was every work on the program created by a female choreographer, but the artistic directors of the visiting companies, Richmond Ballet and The Washington Ballet, were women - Stoner Winslett and Julie Kent. Even though ballet schools may be full of female students, and a lot of female teachers, there’s a scarcity of choreographers and company directors who identify as female.

In fact, a couple years ago, a graduate student analyzing the 2015-2016 performance season of the ten highest-budgeted American ballet companies ($9 million to $60 million, U.S. dollars), found that approximately ten percent of the works were made by women: 111 male choreographers compared to only 13 female choreographers. Prior to Kent’s appointment as director of The Washington Ballet in 2016, and of the “top billing” American ballet companies, only one had a woman in charge: Lourdes Lopez of Miami City Ballet. Out of 59 American companies with budgets between $1 million and $60 million, only 26% are directed by women. This list includes Winslett, the longest tenured company director in the United States, plus artistic directors Virginia Johnson of Dance Theatre of Harlem and Victoria Morgan of Cincinnati Ballet.

Victoria Morgan will be in Salt Lake City next week when Cincinnati Ballet, and Charlotte Ballet (with newly appointed director Hope Muir), share a program with Ballet West. These performances also feature works by female choreographers: Jennifer Archibald, Robyn Mineko Williams, and África Guzmán.

I’m aware that’s a lot of names in just three paragraphs, and this is intentional: I believe one of the reasons for the gender disparity in leadership roles in ballet is that women’s work often goes unnoticed or unacknowledged (parallels could be drawn with women’s domestic labor). When we start to look at the achievements of women who occupy leadership roles, thinking especially of Stoner Winslett, Victoria Morgan, and Virginia Johnson, we see people who have merged longevity, financial stability, and artistic excellence. Their visions, determination, and dedication are extraordinary.

Last night, on stage at the Rose Wagner, there was a similar sense of excellence. As different as each of these companies and choreographers are, the dancers invested in the distinct movement vocabularies and brought to life vivid images of aquatic life, relationships’ tumults, and athletic mating rituals.

Richmond Ballet opened the program with Katarzyna Skarpetowska’s Akwarium (Polish for “Aquarium”). This is the Skarpetowska’s third commission for Richmond’s dancers (following Polaris in 2015 and Scarred Bouquets in 2017). Akwarium’s cast of 12 inhabited her movement with a sense of ease and curiosity. Their rippling torsos and fluid partnering evoked an underwater world, as some dancers had the mercurial qualities of minnows and others took on more sinewy actions. There was no narrative but rather a beautiful sense of immersion in another realm.

The piece began with an empty stage and fluorescent rods gradually illuminated the space, reminiscent of lighting that could be found above a home aquarium. Dancers’ unitards, designed by Fritz Masten, were shades of blue, green, and cobalt; each featured its own delicate details.

Something that distinguishes Skarpetowska’s choreography is her ability to use the stage like a multi-sided box instead of a square with only one front that faces the audience. As a result, one section presented two pairs of dancers, but much of their choreography showed their backs to the audience, giving us a distinct and intriguing view of their pas de deux. In another section, women traveled across the stage with energetic bourrees, but with their backs to the audience, revealing Masten’s beautiful accents in their costumes.  

Entrances often took the form of a man lifting and turning a woman, as if they were being swept onto the stage. Other clever choreographic details included a couple performing downstage as other dancers emerged and exited in fast runs across the upstage area. This kinetic “backdrop” enriched the downstage duet.

A pulsing score by Robert Henke added to the intensity and momentum of Akwarium’s first section. For the last part of the piece, the music shifted to J.S. Bach’s “Allemande.” Throughout the performance, the choreography, lighting, costumes, and music created a multi-layered quality, as vibrant and effervescent as aquatic life. One of the women, Elena Bello, was stunning, imbuing the choreography with fluidity, playfulness, and confidence. Bello also shone in a trio with two of the men, and all of the six men, Marty Davis, Trevor Davis, Matthew Frain, Anthony Oates, Fernando Sabino, and Mate Szentes, were impressive, displaying clean lines and exuberant leaps.

The Washington Ballet brought Myriad, a new work by Gemma Bond, who’s a member of American Ballet Theatre’s corps de ballet. Prior to moving to New York, Bond was a First Artist with the Royal Ballet, and there were vestiges of Kenneth MacMillan’s approach in her Myriad. Set to music by Henry Purcell, the piece presented a cast of six women and one man. Its tone was dramatic with a tinge of angst, as the women often circled their heads with their arms as if wilting or feeling entangled. The costume design by Bond had the women wearing long skirts that they, at times, lifted gently with their hands. The man, Brooklyn Mack in last night’s performance, wore a white sleeveless vest and white tights that stopped just below the knee.

Mack was brilliant in a role that’s a tour de force: partnering each of the six women and delivering his signature great jumps with captivating personality. In contrast, the women seemed more tentative or less confident. Bond’s choreography is complicated and fast. In this program, Myriad had the most recognizably classical vocabulary, although there were moments when Bond experimented with unusual partnering, as when one of the women stood on Mack’s thighs as he grounded himself in a second position plié. In another unusual choice, the women rolled on the floor like logs.

Although there were times when the women seemed to comfort or whisper to one another, each time he was on stage, Mack was the most prominent performer. I was not sure if the six women represented six different relationships with him, or if they were facets of the same relationship, as some duets were capricious, and others more somber. Overall, I was left with a puzzled impression: was Bond reinforcing a stereotype of a man who vacillates between different partners without ever committing to one?

The program closed with Natalie Weir’s jubilant Jabula (Zulu for “Joy”) for Ballet West. Choreographed as a solo in 1993 for Queensland Ballet, Jabula has been “modified” for companies and schools around the world. It’s an exuberant closer, bringing a sense of spectacle to the program’s poetry and drama, and in last night’s version, it was performed by 16 dancers.

Eight men opened the piece with a series of staccato poses that evoked strength and domination. The score by Hans Zimmer, from the motion picture The Power of One, and the costume design by Weir added to the display of power: the men were topless and wore sienna-colored karate pants. As they dispersed, Chelsea Keefer emerged from the backdrop to perform a solo that contrasted with their steps. Her agility and fluidity, as she turned with exquisite grace and extended her legs towards the sky, were a brilliant counterstatement to the men’s unison. Keefer presented a fierce and flickering style that made me think of how her power took the shape of more precise and ninja-like movements, different from the men’s brute poses, but equally compelling.

As the piece continued, there was an athletic trio for three men where one man appeared to be launched through the air, and the entire cast was on stage for the final section, coupled in male/female partnerships. Weir’s choreography mixed handstands and yoga-like poses with acrobatic partnering maneuvers. While the cast displayed these shapes with grace and power, there didn't seem to be much purpose to these feats beyond a display of the dancers’ prowess. In some ways this made Weir’s work a perfect ending, and most of the audience stood to applaud their performance. 

Weir’s work, the only one with women in slippers instead of pointe shoes, also added to the versatility of ways in which women make ballets. If Skarpetowska’s choreography was more detailed and nuanced, with the cast presenting different facets of their technique and exploring distinct qualities of movement, Bond and Weir chose different approaches: their male and female dancers occupied more distinct roles based on gender, but the results were dramatically different.

As a whole, by showcasing a variety of women making work today, the National Choreographic Festival demonstrates why it’s imperative to present this kind of showcase. Last night’s performance made it crystal clear that there’s a spectrum of contributions women are making to the future of ballet. Personally, I was drawn to Skarpetowska’s qualities of movement and the dancers’ abilities to inhabit her style, and this may be because she has established a relationship with Richmond Ballet. A take-away from this observation could be that women not only need to be commissioned more often to create work, but also need to be given repeated opportunities to work with these great artists.

Artists of Ballet West rehearsing Natalie Weir's Jabula. Photo by Beau Pearson.

Kate Mattingly is an assistant professor of dance at the University of Utah. She has a doctoral degree in performance studies from UC Berkeley, and has had writing published in The New York Times, The Village Voice, Dance Research Journal, Dance magazine, and Pointe magazine, among others.

Read Kate's review of the second weekend of the National Choreographic Festival here.

Ririe-Woodbury: Return

Return, the third and final work of Daniel Charon’s “Together Alone” trilogy, premiered in the Eccles Theater's Regent Street Black Box. The space placed the Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company performers in a new and exciting venue, so different from their home at the Rose Wagner. The audience sat in the round, which created an intimate, circular gathering. As the dancers entered, they seemed just an arm’s reach away; their breath could be felt, and every step heard. All of a sudden, strips of light that surrounded the dance floor lit up, creating a tangible border - immediately, the dancers felt detached, separated from the audience. They began moving with a floating, eerie quality that was abruptly interrupted by flashing red lights and a booming voice yelling, “Warning! Warning!” The dancers quickly left the space. This shift added a taste of urgency and tension, mixed with a layer of science-fiction, to the scene.

The dancers then began subtle movement that grew larger to a percussive, intriguing score by the Salt Lake Electric Ensemble. There was a shockingly beautiful moment as Melissa Younker balanced precariously on Bashaun Williams’ leg as he lay on the ground. Her body swayed slightly, from side to side, like an upside-down leaf dangling from a tree.

As the movement became larger and more intense, a constant entering and exiting of bodies developed, eventually giving way to several solos, duets, trios, and larger group phrases. However, each section was brief and interrupted as the dancers quickly exited. These fleeting interactions never felt fully realized. There was a constant, dissatisfying resonance of something left unfinished. As I watched the dancers leap and dive with flying, suspended legs, the performance space felt cramped, like we were looking in on an enclosed environment that was too small, too tight. Yet this bound, constricted space appeared to be an intentional critique of the effect of technology tightening the space around us. The dance seemed to say, “If we are not careful, we will be boxed in by our own devices.”

The piece continued with incredibly dynamic shifts through space and stunningly embodied movement. At one moment, most of the dancers left the space and Yebel Gallegos performed an exquisite solo. As his body rattled and curved, small droplets of sweat sprinkled off of him and twinkled in the luminous light. This moment of splendor led into haunting text, each dancer sharing a single sentence, a fragmented idea: “We had to move on”; “It was hard to tell”; “We have to do it again.” Each carried an ambiguously eerie weight and evoked an apocalyptic scenario. Each dancer seemed to be adding a significant thought on to the last, but they never looked at each other or acknowledged one another’s presence. They seemed so very close together, but also distantly removed.

Later, the dancers stood on opposite edges of the floor, looking out into the audience with their backs to each other. Two dancers at a time would say the same text in a conversation that felt incredibly mechanical. One pairing of dancers wanted to discuss something but the other grouping continued to repeat, “I can’t, I’m expecting someone.” This pixelated conversation was broken and dysfunctional. A tension was created, as something important needed to be shared and communicated but no one knew how to do it. As an audience member, I felt a deep craving for this human interaction to be fulfilled, but the dancers remained separated and unable to complete the urgent conversation.

These moments of intriguing narrative were followed by deeply physical movement. Megan McCarthy and Gallegos had a breathtaking duet. Their bodies rotated in quick, tightly controlled spirals and their legs swirled in luscious circles that carried them to the ground in exciting sweeps of momentum. Return was Mary Lyn Graves’ last performance with Ririe-Woodbury and her dancing was also exquisite throughout the performance.

The costumes for Return were designed by fashion stylist Laura Kiechle, who created the many different looks changed into throughout the show. The costumes introduced new moods and textures throughout. The dancers began in grey and blue shirts and pants that were a blend of Star Trek and post-modern. Later, the dancers filtered back on in all-black costumes that featured an intriguing exposed square on each back. At one point, McCarthy wore a stunning, long peach-colored dress. The final costumes were blue shorts and white shirts that resembled swimwear from the 1950s. The constant changing of costumes continued to introduce a new aesthetic to a continual play of together- and apartness. There was a truly striking development in the way that new costumes were introduced; only a few dancers would change at a time, the new look slowly infiltrating the stage in pieces, as if through a shift in time.

One of the most striking moments was as Gallegos shared lines of text in Spanish: “No hay nadie más en el mundo. No hay nadie más en la vista.” Younker repeated the lines in English: “There is no one else in the world. There is no one else in sight.” The two of them walked along the edge of the lit square and repeated the lines with slight additions and variations. It was striking to watch the others move within the square and to feel their deep separation as Younker and Gallegos spoke about being alone. There was an incredible irony in hearing their call and response in different languages and their inability to connect with each other, or those moving around them - almost as if there was no one left in the world.

Throughout Return, Charon played with the way technology affects, and will affect, human interaction. In many moments, I felt trapped in an episode of Black Mirror. Return presented an impressive collaboration of movement, spoken text, sound, lighting design, and costume design to create imagery of future humans as disconnected beings that exist together, but are mostly alone.

Melissa Younker and Yebel Gallegos in Return. 

Rachel Luebbert is a recent graduate of the University of Utah, having completed a dual degree in modern dance and Spanish. Rachel has also contributed writing to the College of Fine Arts’ blog, The Finer Points.

Ballet West: The Shakespeare Suite

David Bintley’s The Shakespeare Suite, the title piece of Ballet West’s spring season, opens with Kyle Davis as Hamlet and a chorus of four couples slinking across a maroon carpet, the women dressed like Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face and the men (save Davis) in kilts and mesh shirts. Davis and the chorus’s repetitive sharp gestures usher the audience into the comical world created by the marriage of Duke Ellington’s music, Shakespeare’s characters, and Bintley’s tongue-in-cheek choreography. The Shakespeare Suite humorously portrays the most famous Shakespearean characters from both tragedy and comedy in a series of vignettes set to Ellington’s big band sounds.

Christopher Sellars and Katherine Lawrence charmed in the first duet as a Converse-clad, pop punk Kate and Petruchio from The Taming of the Shrew. Lawrence’s eye rolls and huffing marches, all done in a fluffy wedding dress, argued with Sellars’ spiky-haired, jaunty prankster. Typically cast in sparkling but demure roles, it was exciting to see Lawrence’s amusing over-exaggeration.

The only solo of the work was Davis’s portrayal Hamlet, which both opened and closed The Shakespeare Suite. Beginning with a pinpoint focus off stage, Davis, whom I have not had the pleasure of seeing in soloist roles before, showed a confident coolness, even while going mad. His technique skillfully folded into the character, making him an apt guide for Bintley’s surreal world populated by beatnik Shakespeareans.

It was a treat to see Ballet West’s dancers portray characters so far beyond the scope of their typical repertoire. I hardly recognized Adrian Fry stalking across the stage as Othello, and Allison DeBona’s devious smiles made her a delightfully manipulative Lady Macbeth. The ballet showcased a rarely revealed, comedic side of Ballet West. With all its character and wit, The Shakespeare Suite doesn’t try to be more complex than it is; it’s a romp, a gleeful amusement both for the dancers and the audience.

Soloist Jenna Rae Herrera and Demi-Soloist Joshua Whitehead, as Titania and Bottom, in David Bintley’s The Shakespeare Suite. Photo by Beau Pearson.

The first work of the evening, Jiří Kylián’s Return to a Strange Land, was the most benign. Dedicated to John Cranko, Return to a Strange Land presents two pas de trois and two pas de deux, each featuring Kylián’s often imitated style of smoothly intertwined partnering. Costumed in academically simple blue or gold leotards and soft-hued tights, the dancers begin on an autumn-colored stage, piles of leaves in the background, as they wind and unwind their arms, tangling their bodies until interwoven connections emerge. A dancer is lifted in an arch and spun into a deep plié while her partners draw connected circles around her. When the dancers do separate, they rush away from each other, flying around the stage like the leaves piled upstage.  Eventually they come together again, knotting themselves into moments of delicate, embracing balance as their kaleidoscopic shapes, perfectly symmetrical yet complex, emerge and disappear. The partnering is intricate but was deftly handled, especially by Chase O’Connell. Paired with Emily Adams, whose musicality is entrancing, the blue pas de deux was clear and heartfelt without being overly earnest.

Principal Emily Adams and Chase O’Connell in Jiří Kylián’s Return to a Strange Land. Photo by Beau Pearson.

Artists of Ballet West in Jiří Kylián's Return to a Strange Land. Photo by Beau Pearson.j

Principal Emily Adams and Chase O’Connell in Jiří Kylián’s Return to a Strange Land. Photo by Beau Pearson.

I will confess, I was most excited about Ballet West’s spring season because of Summerspace, Merce Cunningham’s masterwork that premiered at the American Dance Festival in 1958. The work was created with Cunningham’s unique collaborative process in which composer, choreographer, and designer each created independently, only coming together at the premiere of the work, a process still imitated as the work is reset on new dancers. Summerspace features colorfully dotted unitards and a backdrop designed by Robert Rauschenberg, as well as a spacious score composed by Morton Feldman. This type of collaborative process is obviously risky, but in this case yields a work where each element is fully realized, able to simultaneously stand on its own and interact with the other elements. Granted, it’s a great help for Summerspace to have had such accomplished collaborators. To quote Feldman, “Say you’re getting married and I tell you the dress won’t be made until the morning of the wedding. But I also tell you it’s by Dior.”  

Though it was the oldest work of the concert, Summerspace was the most unconventional, challenging both physically and conceptually for a typical ballet audience. Its clarity and simplicity made it an easy work to watch, however. Dancers charge through the space with impossible sequences of spins and springs. Spacious lines that lean toward balletic, speedy turning sequences, and simple patterns of skips, triplets, and leaps are juxtaposed against abrupt stillness. The music drifts in and out, filled with silence, almost fluttering past your ears. Ballet West’s cast was spritely in their charming interpretation, and their youthful verve was dazzling. Katlyn Addison’s open presence anchored the work. She kept the lift and speed of Summerspace from flying away, grounding the performance with her voluminous dancing.

Summerspace was clearly a challenge for Ballet West’s dancers: the movement passages are physical non-sequiturs, technically brutal in their composition. But seeing such accomplished dancers struggle is its own reward. In one moment, Katie Critchlow balanced on the subtlest of relevés, shaking as she shifted her weight to one leg. There was a sense of concentration that I have never seen at a Ballet West performance, an almost palpable air of risk. That the dancers were able to maintain humor and playfulness made their attempts and successes even more intriguing to watch. More than once the audience giggled and burst into spontaneous applause, reactions that are as rare as they were delightful and well-deserved.

Mary Lyn Graves, a native of Tulsa, OK, studied dance at the University of Oklahoma. She currently dances with Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company.