In our post-blacklivesmatter 2021 arts landscape in the UK, you could be forgiven for thinking that many institutions have changed, that marginalised identities are being given more space, that anti-racism is becoming centre-stage. And yet, when I try to voice a whiteness-related concern with an institution, most often they reply with a link to their webpage on anti-racism and diversity. Whose job has actually got easier?
Read MoreSwimming is the only time that I feel fully held by the world around me. There’s something about a complete immersion of my body in the water, something about how sound too becomes distorted and other-worldly, how every part of my skin is kissed and touched
Read MoreA series of guides that speak to the freelance dance artist living and working in the UK. Shivaangee interviewed practitioners and compiled these features, on topics ranging from managing bodies to managing money.
Read MoreAshwini explained that she wanted to find ‘the truth behind the mythology’; to dig deeper into the stories she had been told as a child and as a dancer, to find her personal connection to them. It was indeed refreshing to know that such an unpretentious curiosity, grounded in the classical form, could be supported by the Arts Council.
Read MoreI am a practitioner of a dance form that not many white people have heard of, let alone are able to pronounce, so half the conversations I have are reduced to me trying to explain what I do. These conversations inaccurately render Bharatanatyam a minority practice, and I a minority artist, trying endlessly to relate what I do to an elusive notion of ‘mainstream dance’.
Read MoreChennai is undoubtedly the motherland of bharatanatyam, a rich source of tradition, knowledge and technical expertise. Hosts to the most tightly curated bharatanatyam festivals in the world, Chennai is also a gatekeeper of tradition and thus becomes a benchmark for quality bharatanatyam. The UK in comparison has but a fledgling bharatanatyam industry, where practitioners focus on making work that can sit alongside that of mainstream dance choreographers and win over audiences that know nothing of their form.
Read More And I can’t deny it; there’s a part of me that feels deeply satisfied to see the tables turned; to see contemporary dancers challenged by the demands of a Bharatanatyam choreographer.
Read MoreThe intensity of contact time at Dance India 2017 allowed a rare 360-degree intimacy, revealing more about their creative processes, personalities, approaches and journeys than I had imagined I could know.
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