Aditi Mangaldas - Productions
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Footprints on Water
A sojourn through the six Indian seasons, with their varied moods, colours and feelings. One season dissolves into another, one colour into another, a process that continues over and over, evoking images of life that are ever transient, ever changing, ever moving. As the sky changes, the Earth changes, emotions change, we change...
A unique feature of this production is that it incorporates both the classical and the contemporary. It begins absolutely classically but as it progresses it slowly undergoes a transformation to become a totally contemporary production. The dance, the music, the literature, the lights, the costumes, the total ambience changes.
Choreographer's Note
" I was at a crossroad, a friend stated that I would have
to decide the path my dance would take. Traditional or
contemporary? This need to choose left me bereft and confused.
Did one really have to choose, or was it possible for both to
co-exist, to stimulate each other, to maybe answere the dichotomy
within myself? Where does one draw the line anyway? How do I come
to terms with the fact that though I perform an art thousands of
years old, I still look at it with the mind of today?
Hence 'Footprints On Water'. It talks as much about the six
seasons as it does about one form flowing into another. Like
night becoming day and then night again. Each moment of life or
each aspect of a season seems at that time so real, so permenant,
so unchangeble. Yet each thing changes, is transient, is passing.
Can one ever step into the same waters of the river twice?
A Sufi saint once said, "just as the traveller after walking
in the scorching sun, reaches the shade of a tree, the sun moves
on. "
When Eternity Ends - Love passages by Aditi Mangaldas
Inspired by the spinning motion of a top, 'When Eternity Ends' traverses the endless circle of love. It pirouettes freely into space with the first flush of 'Awakening'. Experiences the beauty and fulfillment of the langurous spin of 'Desire'. Discovers the inevitable ties of 'Bondage' and finally falls into the anguish of 'Lament'. All at once feeling pain and peace. Yet, amazingly, readying itself for yet another eternity of love.
Awaking, Desire, Bondage and Lament. A dance on love, a music on love, a poem on love. An unfolding of this emotion through dance, music and poetry. Inspired by poets as varied as Pablo Neruda and Jallalludin Rumi. A contemporary interpretation of this emotion which through the ages has been the focus of all our traditional arts.
Choreographer's Note
" At some stage in life, one feels the need to sky dive. In 'Footprints On Water', I had held on to the parachute of tradition. But suddenly, I felt the need to free-fall. To feel the air rushing by me at a pace of it's own. To land where I will. If this endeavour was to find a place within the traditional kathak repertoire, that was all right by me; but even if it didn't, I felt the need to explore my limits. In "When Eternity Ends" I have attempted to capture the spirit of a top spinning freely. I have let myself go. Let my body mould itself to the winds of time and the journey of love traverse it's own course. "