Worli Paintings and Dance

I have always been intrigued by representations of dance in the visual arts.   On my 2012 dance study trips to India, I was briefly in area of Gol Tekadi Hill, near Daulatabad, near the city of Aurangabad, in Maharashtra. My study trip had been funded through the Shastri Indo-Canadian Fine Arts Fellowship for dance, and I was primarily based in Odisha for my study of classical Indian Odissi dance of Guru Debaprasad Das's lineage, of which I continue to be a lifelong performer, student and researcher. One of the areas of my research was how the local, regional and folk art forms, including those of indigenous communities intersect and inform the revived classical dances, an area which continues to interest me today. My stay in Bhubaneswar was interspersed with watching many dance concerts, and ofcourse daily learnings, and visiting events such as the state-hosted Adivasi Mela (Indigenous Culture Exhibition), where I had the opportunity to witness many pavilions from different parts of Odisha.

 I had a brief sojourn to a different part of India, to Maharastra during my stay and was taken to Aurangabad, to the region of Gol Tekadi Hills. There I encountered a different form of adivasi (indigenous) art, and the representation of dance within this art.  I was fascinated by the visual representations/iconography of the Worli Paintings, and their usage in decorating outdoor spaces.

The Worli community is an indigenous community native to the northern Sahyadri hills of Maharashtra. Their paintings are most often done on the walls of the houses. This tradition is believed to date back to the 2500-3000 BCE, and traditionally only used white paints and pigments.

As seen below, this style of painting frequently depicts multiple human bodies engaged in day-to-day tasks, such as preparation of food, grinding of grains, hunting, or dancing in a group. The body shapes are depicted primarily through triangles, with a triangle each forming the upper and lower part of the body.  Frequently the dancing is represented with a large ensemble of individuals, mostly women, with joined hands, and dancing in spiralling group formations. This dance form is called "Tarpa", and is a large social dance form. There is a sense of movement indicated in this spiraling.

These paintings, while adorning non-indigenous spaces, are also sometimes shown in larger scale than in traditional Worli paintings, such as the larger figures seen on the walls below. 

I did not get a chance to speak with the practitioners of these paintings and of the dances, but I was fascinated by these large paintings. It is also interesting to find that the traditional Worli paintings have influenced designers, fashion designers and several contemporary artists in India. I was gifted a garment by a Pune-based fashion designer, and she had painted traditional Worli dance motifs on the garment designed especially for me, as she knew I was a dancer. 

The visit to the Gol Tekadi Hills was defnitely an enriching encounter with the world of Worli painting! 

Watching Uzbek Culture and Theatre during the Pandemic: The Five Wives of Hadja Nasreddin by Uzbekistan State Drama Theatre

 Over the course of the past several months, while staying at home during the multiple lockdowns in our Ontario province in Canada, I have had the privilege and pleasure of attending a number of online Uzbek arts, culture and performance events on Zoom organized by European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in association with Orzu Arts of England and British Uzbek Society. I started attending these Zoom events around Christmas time; with my first being an Andijan Polka dance workshop taught by Gulandom Qurombaeva, and later the masterclass on the Mustahzod taught by Mashxura Tolibovna. The experience, cultural engagement and educational value offered by these workshops and masterclasses was truly enriching and well-worth getting up in the early hours for (I woke up at 5:00 am to make it in time for the 6:00 am workshops in December and January which were offered in London time).

I’ve recently also attended a number of sessions scheduled during the Spring in celebration of Nowruz. One of these offerings was a screening of the performance of The Five Wives of Hadja Nasreddin, directed by Rasuljon Tagaykulov, performed by Uzbekistan State Drama Theatre, which I had the opportunity to watch yesterday. Being a Theatre Minor from Queen’s University, and having taken a number of Theatre Department courses during my PhD in Dance Studies at York University (Department of Dance, York University), I was truly excited to watch this production, which was my first exposure to theatre performance from Uzbekistan. Sharing below a few reflections and screenshots I took on phone while watching the production!  

The set design for this production features rich decor and detail, with 5 striking curtained doorways adorned with suzani and other traditional textile panels. The set in itself makes the play a visual treat!

The play was delightful to watch the actions and delivery by each of the five actresses and  the lead actor playing Nasreddin. 

 I particularly enjoyed watching tableau moments of the characters gathered at centre in their colourful traditional costumes, making a very memorable visual experience.

The most fascinating part for me was the establishment of the characters through dance and movement elements. The play begins with all five wives entering the stage and performing a short dance in unison, singing “The mind of a women cannot be conquered by any man.” They are accompanied by prerecorded singing and musical accompaniment. 

Later in the play, as each of the five wives is introduced, they perform a short dancelike segment performed to the doira (frame drum), sometimes accompanied by their own singing, sometimes just with percussive accompaniment, establishing the distinct character and persona of each wife. We are introduced to the first wife, Jannat, the daughter of the executioner; the young and flirtatious Tamanna Banu who is the second wife; the third wife, the cleaning-obsessed Zubeida; and the fourth wife, Tutikhon, who is hard of hearing. Finally, we are introduced to his original wife, Fatima. The percussive motifs were different for each wife character, and each actress danced with a distinctive physicalization.  Zubeida dances around the space with a broom, and sings about her obsession of cleaning.  Tutikhon introduces herself with dance, singing as she dances, and her song itself is about dance. The second wife, Tamanna Banu, also depicted as the youngest wife, dances the most frequently, introducing herself later to Nasreddin’s original wife, also by dancing. 

Its interesting to note that its primarily the women whose characters are established through these short dance-like moments within the play while the male character personas in this play are typically established through the dialogue or monologues.

In the post-screening discussion session with the director and cast, it was revealed that the most challenging part of the artistic process of the production was rehearsing during the pandemic, especially in regards to spatial blocking and movement, as rehearsals were done largely via Zoom. It is truly heartening to see theatre workers and cultural workers continue their valuable work during this pandemic. While travel is not an option currently, it is exciting to wake up early or stay up late at odd hours to experience and learn art. Gratitude to organizers such as EBRD, Orzu Arts and British Uzbek Society who make it a possibility during these challenging times with these initiatives!

Culinary Adventures in Learning Music and Dance

In my culture, we mark celebrations and the start of something new with the taste of sweetness, often marked by a bite of something sweet. I thought I would start my first blogpost of the year with a mention of something sweet. Coincidentally, this post is also triggered by an incident:  a few days ago, after rehearsal, I went to a family-owned Iraqi eatery for dinner, and the lovely lady there gave me a large zalabiya. Biting into this delicious treat, I was immediately struck by memories of  home and the Indian jalebi (the South Asian jalebi is indeed a descendant of the Arabic zalabiya and the Iranian zolabia, as Tim Richardson, in "Sweets: A History of Candy" points out, and many readings throughout the internet also mention). The irony  is amusing: despite having grown up in Delhi, the home of the streetsnack jalebi and city of the celebrated Jalebiwali Gali (alleyway of  Jalebis)  in Chandni Chowk in Old Delhi, I was  famous in my family for not having a sweet tooth as a child (I have since acquired a bit of a sweet tooth as an adult, but not entirely), and always found jalebi to be an overly sugary and overrated, and yet being introduced to the Iraqi zalabiya, I was suddenly fascinated by the jalebi.

Our study into the music and dance, especially dance, is not complete without a study of the contextual clothing culture and jewellery of the region and specific culture that the dance practice springs from. To this experience, Mike and I  also add in the adventure of exploring the cooking foods of the cultures we study music and dance from. It is part of our preparations before we go to a new culture for immersive study, as well as after our travels. Before our 2015 study trip to Turkey, where I was studying Turkish Romani and Anatolian dance forms under a Canada Council for the Arts grant, Mike and I attempted our own versions of Turkish cooking from traditional recipes. Several of the dance forms I study draw inspiration from the activities of everyday life, including activities involved in preparation of food, such as churning of butter, fetching water from the river, preparing desserts, stirring pots of honey for baclava, gathering wheat during harvest, preparing tea, delicately carrying tea glasses, cutting pomegranates, pouring tea, and many other activities. I find that the corporeal experience of cooking the foods brings me a little closer to the realities of these physical experiences.

It is also interesting how the different preparations include different physicalities. I include below two different photos of tea/chai, which would involve very different physicalities in preparation:

Indian chai in the home of my Kalbeliya dance teacher Gulabo Sapera in Jaipur.  Milk tea, with ginger and spices. 

Azeri tea, made on a charcoal samovar outdoors, on a beautiful spring day in Toronto, at the home of my student. Served with dates and candies, and also featuring my students artwork underneath. 

I find that the two distinctive tea traditions would involve very different physicalities in their preparation. 

Metaphors of different foods, desserts, tea, and wine are often present in the poetry that many of the dances I study are based on. In my dance training,  also find that many of the metaphors used by my teachers during their teaching often compare movements to the cooking and preparation of food. Quite often, many of my dance teachers themselves make excellent specialty dishes. 

However, it is more often that I miss the foods of the places that I study in. I  often stay in my regions of dance study for a period of time. I have a deep love for simple, homecooked food, and for me, nothing feels more complete than a hearty homecooked meal. When I come back to home base in Toronto, I try to recreate these experiences through culinary adventures. Upon my return from my study trip to Odisha in 2012, during which I stayed in the home of my teacher, Gurushri Durgacharan Ranbir, I tried making dalma, the wholesome, hearty and delicious Oriya lentil and vegetable curry taken with rice. Since our recent trip to Rajasthan, focused on the study of Kalbeliya and allied dance and music traditions, Mike and I have tried making our own versions of Misi Roti, with some substitutions based on our local availabilities. I also deeply miss my everyday breakfast of chhatua in Odisha, and also the breakfast at the Dicle University State Conservatory in Diyarbakir in  Turkey during my 2015 study trip, during which we stayed at the Conservatory's guesthouse.

In Toronto, biting into the delicious and crunchy sweetness, I found that the zalabiya's overwhelming sensory hit suddenly made me think of the interconnectedness of so much food throughout the Silk Road, which is an area of focus in our artistic work and scholarly study at Ensemble Topaz. I thought I would start my first post of this year, which has already been a very busy year, with the taste of something sweet. In the coming weeks, I hope to write about my recent dance learning adventures in Rajasthan, India, where I studied the Kalbeliya dance and its allied movement and music traditions, with gratitude to the Ontario Arts Council and Chalmers Family Foundation.  In the meantime, I might also try to make zalabiya from a traditional recipe.



Current Read: 

• "Sweet Delights from a Thousand and One Nights: The Story of Traditional Arab Sweets" by  Habeeb Salloum and Leila Sallomiartas

A Few Updates from a Busy Month

July had been a fun, but busy month! For both Mike and myself, as well as our music-dance group Ensemble Topaz! I thought I'd take a few moments to write a few memories from July.

The Canada Day weekend at the start of July was an exciting and fun start to the month. I performed earlier in the day at Pickering Markets Canada Day Diversity Celebration in Pickering, and that evening, the dancers of Ensemble Topaz and I performed at a beautiful wedding at The Vue in Etobicoke.

The next day, the dancers and musicians of Ensemble Topaz performed at the Ontario Place Mainstage, for the Ontario Heritage Festival. This was a fun gig..the musicians performed a combination of traditional tunes as well as some of Mike Anklewicz's original Klezfactor compositions, while the dancers and I performed three different styles of dance. This was my first time visiting Ontario Place, which has been newly renovated, and I found the grounds beautiful. It was also fun and refreshing to work again with live music, although we missed our bandleader Mike, who was playing his own gig at the Redpath Waterfront Festival just a few kilometres away!

                                                     Photo Credit: Larry Anklewicz 

A pic of the girls and I on the grounds overlooking the water, with the CN Tower in the background. 

We will be joining forces again with our musicians for some live music-dance performances for the Culture Days weekend this September, for which we are very excited! Please join us at the Annette Street Library on September 29 (Friday) and at the Palmerston Library Auditorium on September 30 (Saturday) from 3:00-4:00 pm! Free and open to all, like all Culture Days events! (http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?R=EVT297481)

The second weekend of July found the girls and I at the beautiful Riverwalk Commons in Newmarket, for the Culture Bridge Festival Sights and Sounds of India. We truly enjoyed this one! I had previously performed classical Indian dance at the Culture Bridge Music evening at East Gwillimbury earlier in June, and it was great to return to perform for these fun and fabulous folks with the group this time. Immediately after this performance, Mike and I left in our car to go to Osgoode in the Ottawa area to join our friends from Troupe Obskurah for a weekend of performing and site animation at the Kingdom of Osgoode medieval festival. 

The following weekend, Angelica and I had a number of duet performances at private events, and the following day, all three of us performed at the Albert Campbell Square for Scarborough Celebrates 150. I also performed Afghan dance at a number of Eid events over this weekend. The photos below are of me and Angelica from some of the different duet gigs over this weekend. 

Above: at Scarborough Convention Centre 

At Grand Empire Banquet and Convention Centre

The following Friday, we performed at the Indo-Canada Arts Council's Diwali Razmatazz Curtainraiser at the Great Hall at Markham Civic Square. It was a lovely event, and also attended by the mayor of Markham. I loved the space of the Markham Civic Square and add below this photo taken in this space, before our performance. 

Over the weekend following this, Ensemble Topaz performed in the east end..Saturday began with Angelica and I performing at MP Salma Zahid's Community BBQ at the Birkdale Community Centre. Sharing below a photo from this event, in the lovely outdoor space of Birkdale Park. 

Photo Credit: community photographer

From there we went to the Gerrard Festival of South Asia, where Stella joined us, and the three of us performed for the festival, during our two day presence at the festival. This marked my return to the Festival of South Asia after 8 years..I had first performed there during its innaugural year in 2008.  Here we also met several of our friends from the dance and South Asian performance world, such as our friends from Salsa Toronto. I'd like to also extend gratitude to Kabul Kabab House for their incredible hospitality during my visits on both days of this festival. 

Photo Credit: Irfan Ali 

The weekend after this, I performed at a corporate client appreciation event where I was requested to perform traditional Loghari dance to rubab music. I truly appreciated performing these traditional numbers, and it was a lovely event. The next day, the dancers of Dilan Dance Company, under the leadership of Artistic Director Fethi Karakecili, in collaboration with Boostan Multicultural Collective, performed at the Tirgan Festival at Harbourfront. I performed two solos here, both choreographed by Fethi Karakecili..one in the style of the contemporary Kurdish solo performance (a piece that was originally developed for and premiered at Karakecili's "The Dance of Colours: Legend of Newroz" (2014) world premiere, and a second piece titled "Arman Arman" in the style of Khorasani Kurdish, uniquely featuring a large Kurdish daf (frame drum) within the dance, which was choreographed by him this year (2017) for the Dilan Dance Company performance at John Candy Theatre, Second City in June. 

Below are some photographs from this performance, all taken by photographer Ken Dobb. 

Photo Credit: Ken Dobb 

After the performance, I also got a chance to enjoy the dance performance by Silk Road Dance Company from Maryland, USA performing at the WestJet Stage at the Tirgan Festival. Then I went to Arabesque to attend the Iraqi hetcha3 workshop taught by Samantha Burnstein, visiting dancer and  choreographer (Sara Mali handcrafted jewellery) from Montreal. It was wonderful to partake in this workshop, which I found to be a very cathartic experience, and it was also great to reconnect with many friends whom I hadn't seen in a long time. 

From there, Mike picked me up and we headed east to  the Beaches Jazz Festival, and to the home of our friends Angelica and Doug, who hosted a Beaches afterparty Bloc party, where I performed solo as well as three dance numbers with the Ensemble Topaz dancers. 

Finally we ended the month of performances the next day, with the Ensemble Topaz dancers and I performing at the beautiful Grand Banking Hall at the One King West Hotel in downtown Toronto. We performed my new choreography to a well-loved Pashto song, at the request of the client, as well as a contemporary Arabic piece. Sharing below a few photos from this beautiful space. 

Was a fun month! 

A few more months until Mike and I take off on our overseas dance and music travels. It has been a good summer so far, and we hope to see you at some of our future public events! Please join us in September for two Culture Days events which we are proud and delighted to be a part of: first at Annette Street Library on September 29th (http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?Entt=RDMEVT300182&R=EVT300182), and secondly at Palmerston Library Theatre on September 30th from 3:00-4:00 pm (http://www.torontopubliclibrary.ca/detail.jsp?R=EVT297481). 

Both events are free! We look forward to sharing some of our work with you. 

Dancing in Intimate Spaces and Salons

The first day of 2017 found myself and Mike driving to a beautiful home in Bethesda. There I started my year dancing in a beautiful home, with exquisite decor. I performed there a small part of my classical Indian dance repertoire, and then also a bit of my Afghan repertoire. It was a warm and wonderful evening, full of friends old and new, and delicious traditional food, and was my introduction to the home-cooked Persian abgoosth. I share below some photos taken at this beautiful home. Among the exquisite decor in the home was the striking peacock lamp, which can be seen behind me. 

                                                 

                                                           Photo Credit: Arash Bateni

Upon returning to Toronto, my first Toronto performance was also, incidentally, in a home setting. This time, it was an Ensemble Topaz dance performance in a lavish and beautiful home of a wonderful arts philanthropist. Working in the arts industry always brings a variety of exciting dance and music experiences.  It is also interestingly coincidental that some of my first professional collaborations with Mike were at house concerts and in-house parties, where we partnered up as musician and dancer.

Last year, I had another interesting salon-space performance experience, at the Bellerive Room inside Toronto's beautiful Aga Khan Museum, during my Pop Up Performance weekend in November. Here's a photo from this performance in this beautiful Persian salon-style room, which also houses the Aga Khan family's private collection of ceramics. My last two performances on each of the two days were held in this room.

                                                    Photo Credit: Amin Bhanji 

During my years growing up in New Delhi, India, we would frequently find ourselves at house performances of both singing and dancing, as well as poetry recitation, for gatherings of family and friends. This parallel performance world lay outside of the formal performances done as a classical Indian dancer in more formal stages and events, and is perhaps a memory that most Bengali children
can relate to. The house concert, the intimate salon performance, or informal or somewhat formal performances in home spaces are both challenging and exciting. I also find that they often allow for an in-depth engagement with the audience, and as an artist, I enjoy inhabiting this parallel performance world in addition to the formal stage/performance space.

Reflections: Nowrooz Celebration and Exhibition of Afghan Culture

This year, I had the pleasure of attending Nowrooz Celebration and Exhibition of Afghan Culture hosted by the Pluralist Community at Noor Cultural Centre. This was my second visit to the Noor Cultural Centre (the first had been in 2013, for my own performance at the Intercultural Diversity Festival which had taken place exactly a week before my PhD defense! I remember at the time, several of my friends and family were asking me how I continued to actively perform professionally while finishing my dissertation and defense at final stages!). This was my first time returning to the Centre, three years after the completion of my PhD, in a much more relaxed time, and in celebration of Nowrooz.

The evening was filled with delicious food, sights and colours, between which I got a chance to engage in a few conversations. I most especially looked forward to the cultural performances, and throughout the evening I caught several beautiful performances.

The cultural events of the evening opened with a group vocal rendition by several young ladies, singing the traditional wheat-pudding stirring song "Samanak." They were all attired in their traditional outfits, and three beautiful ladies sitting at centre sang solo sections within the song.

There were recitations of poetry, in both Farsi and English, of the legendary Rumi, who was born in Balkh (in either Afghanistan or greater Bakh  in present-day Tajikistan - the exact location of his birthplace remains debated). This was followed by a Sama generously hosted by the Sufi Cultural Centre of Toronto. The whole room went into stillness as the musicians began, and a few minutes later, the whirlers entered and bowed to each other and then began the Sema.  This is a photograph  I managed to capture on my cellphone from this moving performance.

Sema at Noor Cultural Centre, generously hosted by Sufi Cultural Centre of Toronto

March 18, 2017

This had been the first time since my trip to Turkey in 2015 that I had the opportunity to witness Sema, complete with live music. During the 2015 dance study sojourn to Turkey (gratitude to Canada Council for the Arts), during the Istanbul stay, Hasan Evren, an excellent folk dancer, dance teacher and davul performer, and also friend and former colleague of Toronto-based Artistic Director Fethi Karakacili, had taken us to Darvish Cafe. Here is a photo I had taken back then.

Darwish Cafe, Sultanahmet, Istanbul, 2015

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At the Pluralist Nowrooz Exhibition, I also enjoyed a beautiful poem in English, filled with imagery, on Afghanistan, by a young poetess who recited her own poetry. I believe her name was Mozghan. There was also a dance performance done by four energetic young performers who had everyone cheering and clapping along!

I was also very engaged by a Dombura performance by a young gentleman. I did not catch his name. I am quickly beginning to gain a deep appreciation of this instrument, and hope to hear more of this young artist soon.


Throughout the evening, I had the opportunity to see some beautiful traditional dresses and headwear, and I took a few photos. Below is a Hazaragi headddress from Bamyan, Central Afghanistan.

The evening ended with a fashion show, with beautiful traditional costumes and jewellery. I captured this photo of the models in their outfits when they posed in front of the photo wall prior to the fashion show itself. 

A wonderful evening of rich colours, music, dance, poetry and food..I truly enjoyed it! 

Montreal in March!

This past weekend found me in vibrant and beautiful Montreal, a city to which I returned after several years. I was there as part of a Central Asian dance tour during which we stopped in the city for a night and performed at La Salle Oscar Peterson in 2008,  and a second time for  performance at Caf' Conc Theatre with the Saucy Tarts in 2011. 

This time, I had the engaging and joyful experience of teaching there. I taught a a class on Tajik dance, followed by workshop on Afghan and Anatolian dances, hosted by Sanaa Dance/Sanaa Danse at beautifully sunlit studios of Studio Caravane. It was a joy to meet the dancers there, some of whom were from the company and local to Montreal, and others who had come in to join the workshops from Trois-Rivières.

I stayed in Mile End, at the home of my dear friends Paroma and Branden.  They currently live in a beautiful home filled with very interesting books, and decor from across the world. As I played a song in my headphones the first night- "Mana Manam"- the Tajik Zafar Ayubi version (a song which has special significance for me - I heard it several years ago on the cassettes of my friend Sara, who played the Persian versions for me in Kingston), I enjoyed the glow of this beautiful hanging lamp. Coincidentally, this lamp also reminds me of a tulip flower, which is recurrent in poetry and imagery of many Persianate and Central Asian cultures, which felt like a fitting atmosphere for this song! 

Below is a photo taken at the Studio Caravane the next day, with the brave participants of the workshop! I am wearing here the costume from Diyarbakir, Turkey which Gonul Ozturkman (faculty member at Dicle University State Conservatory Dance Department in Diyarbakir) helped me select. 

It was truly a delight to work with all of them, and I also cherished catching up briefly with Samantha Burnstein, the Artistic Director of Sanaa Dance (http://www.sanaafolklore.com/), whose work on folklore dancing I deeply respect. The company is hosting some fantastic folklore workshops this month, the details of which can be found on their Facebook page:  www.facebook.com/Sanaa-Dance-Sanaa-Danse-247173315413126/