Mays’ Buns and Roses meeting took us a little deeper behind the glitzy showbiz face of Bollywood chorus lines into the deeply spiritual world of Bharatnatyam dance with our expert with bells on (and then some!) Shrikant.
Shrikant trained in India and now travels the world teaching and educating people on the cultural routes, symbolism and spirituality of this art form which could be loosely compared to the Indian form of ballet with a heavy mystic influence!
Bharatnatyam dance was originally founded within the Hindu temples of Southern India performed by women but found a popular revival and explosion post independence in India in 1947 with many men taking up the practice.
For his first presentation Shrikant performed a purely technical piece introducing all of the lovely Rosee’s assembled to the movements of
Bharatnatyam set to traditional Indian music, including movements that represent elements and forms in nature whilst drawing on and transliterating the spiritual energy of the world.
In his second recital, Shrikant introduced us to the emotive interpretative dance form of Bharatnatyam, giving his own presentation of a modern story of one woman’s connection with nature and the purpose in life this has presented her.
For his finale we were given a glimpse of the art as it would have originally been performed as a spiritual piece combining the emotive and technical as a means of telling a story and expressing associated emotions to an audience within a temple setting, in his homage to Krishna, the Beautiful One.
All of us left feeling a little happier in the world with Shrikants’ beautiful movement and talk having brought a touch more joy to our inner selves.
