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The two-day presentation at Shri Ram Centre, under the aegis of Gati Dance Forum comprised works evolving out of Gati's Summer Dance Residency assisting aspiring choreographers coming from different countries and dance backgrounds, traditional and contemporary, through a ten-week, intense dance exchange to develop their own movement expressions, providing each dancer with financial support, individual monitoring and workshops, rehearsal space and production assistance.
The mentors were Maya Krishna Rao the well known Theatre artist, Chris Lechner a movement artiste working with dance and installation art and Anusha Lall founder Director of The Gati Dance Forum, a Bharatanatyam dancer working on new perspectives in the classical dance form. The guest mentors were Victoria Hauke a Hamburg based choreographer and Jean Christophe Lanquetin, a scenographer based in France.
By far the best work was "One Voice" by Nongmeikapam Surjit (Bonbon) founder of Nachom Arts of Contemporay Dance Company Manipur. Built round the trauma of torture where both victim and torturer suffer similar pangs, the focused intensity of movement showing the convulsed, tortured body pulled, stretched, gagged, stifled and thrown around, pointed to unique creative imagination.
The last movement in an accelerando, with a shuddering body, making even the face become a blur, accompanied by the extraordinarily emotive vocalisations, marked the point of climax. The contrast in the end was a peaceful lilting Manipuri movement accompanied by a "Haiyaho.." with the dancer distancing himself from the entire scene by getting off the stage to settle on a chair facing performance space like a viewer from outside.
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