Aswathy Rajan
They proved, what their name is meant to be. This is a thanks-note to the divine dance duo; Devi Girish and Girish Chandra. As it is not meant for the purpose of review, let the writer be free for expressing what touched utmost to the core about the Kuchipudi-eve. The duo presented a Kuchipudi recital ‘Shiva-sankareeyam’ as part of the Soorya Dance fest, organized by the Thalam Cultural trust in Thrissur last Monday. It was a pure Margam, cultivated with appropriate hues of creativity. They began with the traditional ‘Amba Paragu’, an invocatory song, delivered behind the curtain. Interestingly, the first one of the repertoire was a Soorya Stuti (Choreography of Guru Vempati Chinnasathyam) thematically, the spinal one of the repertoire was actually nothing new. But, surprisingly, it seemed all new to the spectators. Shiva-sankareeyam, a story binds the love and separation of lord Shiva and his consort Sati Devi. The duo, created a magic to this thread. Striking episodes that stamped a bloody-mark on the hearts of connoisseurs were the ‘burning of Sati’ and ‘the uproar of Shiva’. When danseuse Devi portrayed this act, we could literally feel the outflow of the inner flames of Sati and it spread to the frontal lobe of our brain. While, we saw on the other side the true traumatic Shiva, in a state to gulp the world completely. His eyes were of volcanic-eruption, his body was trembling with anger and that hit on us, finally he roared, we slipped into the aura of trance. And when it still resonates in my heart, after a week, I recognize it was the true moment I was blessed with the touch of Swathika-Bhava. Thanks to them.
As a lover of Kuchipudi, I would want to take all of your attention into their choreographic competence. There is a lot more choreographic lessons one could grasp from this duo. These days you get to see Kuchipudi in all different expressions. When I respect all these individual expressions, I humbly disagree applauding some of the most celebrated ones of this market-age. I see those ones only as a failing combinational model of choreography. It is no good to watch, the great ideas of movements, conceived and created by the gurus of yore, placing awkward. One has to understand the real trait of choreography before getting overwhelmed with such gimmicking market-ideas. Girish and Devi as a young dance-duo mark their signature in this realm. The thing reverberates in Girish’s Choreography is firstly the genuineness. The movement patterns he creates are not a mixture of any concepts already existed. But he (re)creates from the very base and extend the legacy of his school with fresh ideas and flow of grace. The bench mark of a good choreography could be the flow and uninterruptedness. (As said by our respected gurus, Movements have to flow from one to the other.) This dance-duo is blessed with such competence to make ceaseless movement-transitions and postural-designs of grace. Devi and Girish could be one of the true vehicles of Kuchipudi art tradition.
aswathy rajan
