Kaliyuga Review
Contributed By - Rupanjana Sengupta
On Saturday, the 4th of August 2018 @Hamilton High School the students from Nita Mallya’s Sampradaya School of Dance presented a fabulous and inspiring dance production named “Kaliyuga”. What was unique was the fact that the productions concept, choreography and costumes were all conceptualized by the young students themselves. Even the music and orchestra were comprised of young students who are proficient as musicians and singers. The antiquity of Indian Mythological stories was brought to life by their sheer hard work of young individuals who are all growing up here in the United States.
Display of ethnic roots not only helps us to connect to each other but to connect with individuals with different ethnicity weaving the quilted cultural mosaic of our beloved United States. At the end all our core values are very universal in nature and wholly point towards the greater good. It was joyful to see diverse audience enjoying the essence of this production “Kaliyuga” based on Lord Vishnu’s Dashavatar.
As we know it is very interesting to see that Darwinian evolutionary theory, when viewed from a certain perspective, neatly intersects with the ten incarnations of Lord Vishnu. Dashavatar interestingly gives us a “rough idea” of vertebrate evolution: a fish, a tortoise, a boar, a man-lion, a dwarf and then followed by four men and Kalki is yet to be born.
The young artist group took this concept of Dashavatar’s mythological stories and interlaced the core values of each Avatar’s story with perceptions identifiable within their modern environment. The performance had two segments dedicated to each Avatar – One was the mythic story followed by the contemporary connectivity to today’s recognizable environment. Few of the examples are given below.
The mythic story of Avatar Matsya (Fish) saving the humanity from the coming dangers of deluge this was interpreted as a value that needs to be inculcated to express the same compassion, kindness and empathy to the modern global issue of insurgency/refugee.
In the Avatar Kurma (Tortoise) story both the opposing factions of Devas and Asuras works together in Samudra Manthan to churn out the nectar of immortality, in the same way the modern idea would be the thought of bi-partisan working environment for politicians, encouraging cooperation of opposing parties to bring about the greater good.
Avatar Varaha (Boar) restored the earth back to life. The value of restoring our ecosystem and respecting our Mother nature thus avoiding destructive trends that is detrimental to our own beautiful planet.
Avatar Narasimha ended the reign of intolerant dogmatic king in the same way the modern interpretation is encouragement of religious tolerance. Forgetting the differences and celebrating the similarities.
In the story Avatar Vamana, Mahabali belittles (dwarf) Vamana by underestimating him for his physical attributes the modern interpretation of this story was our present environment of selfie generation. Thinking beyond the physical opens a whole new dimension of perception, allowing us to see beyond the surface and into the essence of people we meet.
At the end the story of Avatar kalki encourages cooperation validating our individuality in all our differences. The Kaliyuga, is a time for all of us to unify against the forces that seek to divide us. Only the true understanding, acceptance, tolerance, kindness and awareness of self would bring us altogether with that our peaceful sustainability.
The dancers Ariyal Jain, Aisiri Samak, Bhumika Phanindra, Lekha Kuttalingam, Janani Lakshmanan, Keertana Sripathi, Lahari Samak and Vaishnavi Nair did a fantastic job of writing the script, choreographing the concept and even directing themselves. The lights operated by Sonia Jain. The young orchestra comprising of Aditi Tata (Hindustani vocal artist), Neel Raghav Ramesh (tabla), Ankith Ramaan (Flute), Aatmik Mallya (Piano, digital synthesizer and Keyboard), Sushil Sudhakar (Veena and Mridangam) who composed the music themselves keeping the balanced fusion of the west and the east. It was a marvelous feat to watch this extravagance unfold on stage.
Thanks to Guruji Srimati Nita Mallya at Sampradaya School of Dance, Guruji Sri Manu Srivastava Vocal Instructor Hindustani classical music at Phoenix Gharana, Guruji Sri Prafulla Athalye at Phoenix Gharana tabla instructor, Guruji Mahesh Subramanium, Guruji K.R Subramanium,Guruji Ms. Judy Anderson, Guruji Sadrokh Soloman, Sri Sudhakar and Srimati Sheela Sudhakar. These are the respected teachers who have given these young students the gift of art, music and dance that not only teaches them to perform but also enables them to appreciate and interpret the art form so that they can entertain as well as enlighten the audience.
The program was a charity show to help out Aruna Chethana, a school for special needs children in Bangalore and Huskies supporting Huskies (Hamilton High) US, showing us the way that a young student’s skill set can bring about a higher positive change. This was not only enjoyable but also a great learning experience to watch young American Indians internalizing the traditional stories and then interpreting them so beautifully… Connecting the dots so intelligently that’s how cultural “kathas”/ stories unravel and then travel through the centuries.