Indian classical artists have long been the flagbearers of our country’s rich heritage. Sohini Roychowdhury, founder and creative director of Sohinimoksha World Dance and Communications, founder and director of Sohinimoksha Artes De La India in Madrid, Spain, dancer, movement director, professor of Natyasastra, Bharatanatyam Guru, and author, is one such prominent flagbearer. Currently, she is on her 30th tour of Europe, which started in May and will end in August, and is being sponsored by the Austrian Ministry of Culture. Earlier this year, she also released a fascinating book called “Dancing with the Gods” about Bharatanatyam and her practice. She speaks to the Sunday Guardian about this book and her vision for it.
Excerpts from an edited interview
Q. Please tell us about your artistic practice.
A. I grew up in Kolkata as the daughter of Sitar maestro Pandit Subroto Roychowdhury and sculptor Uma Roychowdhury. I learned Bharatanatyam from Guru Thankumani Kutty and Guru Kalamamdalam Venkitt and lived in Spain for 12 years. Currently, I am based out of Kolkata, but I travel six months of the year between the UK, Austria, Germany, Spain, and New York. I have students in 14 countries who perform at my dance operas along with me. Some of our performances have included the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas for the President of India, the opening ceremony at the Oscars at the premiere of ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ for Danny Boyle, the IIFA opening, performances for UNESCO in Austria, and many others. I have performed and am a visiting professor at 18 universities in Europe, including the UK, South America, and Russia. My work on the Natyashastra and its comparison to Aristotle’s theories of Dramatic Unity is taught in various colleges on the subject of Indology and performing arts. My repertoire includes training marginalised children as budding artistes of tomorrow. This includes the children of “Little Big Help” in Kolkata, who are being trained to be Bharatanatyam dancers. I have worked towards healing with dance with the women inmates of Byculla jail and their children, the children of red-light areas under Apne Aap, and the deaf and mute abandoned girl children in Rajasthan.
Q. Congratulations on the publication of your book, “Dancing with the Gods”. How did it come about?
A. This is my first book, and my version of dance and mythology seen through the prism of humanism and empathy. I was asked to put together a coffee table book that captures the multicultural world of Sohinimoksha and its magic. The COVID lockdown seemed like the right time to do so, and that is how “Dancing with the Gods” came to be published by Roli Books. I chose this subject as it is a reflection of my world, and I put together all my seminars at various universities and cultural centres, along with photographs from our shows that feature my troupe members and students from different parts of the world. It’s my love story and my eternity, and it defines the core mantra of my work, which is ‘Connecting Civilizations.’
Q. Please tell us about your writing process from start to finish.
A.The writing process was magical as we put together my research and my stories of the stage from women’s empowerment with the mother goddesses – Durga, Kali, Santa Sarah, and Ishtar. The many moods of the Ashtanayika, the movement of dance through patriarchy and Victorian hypocrisy, and the plight of the Devadasis We worked towards breaking the myths around them, as the western world considers them prostitutes. I have also written about the LGBTQIA community by exploring the character of Shikhandi in the Mahabharata and all its counterparts in Greek and Egyptian mythology. I talk about lesser-known goddesses like Mansa, our Snake Goddess, and her Egyptian counterpart. I wrote about Shiva as Ardhanareeswarar-part man and part woman to be a complete human. I have spoken about our sacred philosophies, our sacred stories, the magic of our Vedas and Puranas and their inclusive, humane aspects that need to be understood beyond India’s exotica. My art director, with her magical and surreal vision, put together the visual aspect of the book, including the cover, the colours, in the true spirit of our Sohinimoksha World Dance operas. I made sure that all my troupe members and students from all over the world were featured in the book in their stage avatars. Writing the book was retelling and reminiscing a love story like a gypsy who travels from place to place and celebrates a connectedness, an eternal truth—that the world is one. My book ‘Dancing with The Gods’ is available at all leading bookstores like Oxford, Starmark, and all others, at Waterstones in the UK, and on Amazon, to name a few. I encourage everyone to get a copy.
Q. Please tell us about Shaktism and your relationship with it.
A.A large portion of my book is dedicated to Shaktism, and I have explored Shaktism through dance and storytelling. I speak about our mother goddesses and the need for the world to acknowledge the ills of patriarchy and bigotry. Durga stands for a woman who can choose good over evil and has the right sense to judge and choose. Saraswathi symbolises education and how it brings about the light of evolution. Laxmi, the goddess of wealth and abundance, is all about the economic empowerment of women. We refer to the Ardhanareeswarar as a man complimenting a woman without the feminisation of a man. Forgiveness is also an important part of empowerment, and in our dance production, Ma Durga doesn’t kill the bull demon Mahisasura but shows him mercy and transforms him. The Sufi philosophy, Rumi’s poetry, and Tagore’s humanism are aspects of women’s empowerment for me. I have performed themes of Shaktism with my troupe all over the world—in museums, universities, and festivals.
Q. What exciting project are you working on next?
A.Besides my dance productions, I am working on ‘Stage-Stories’, my next book, that is a comparative study of the Natyasastra in the prism of Aristotle’s dramatic theories-the core philosophy being ‘It’s one world’. I also speak of world cinema here to explain the Navarasas.
Q. A message for the audience?
A. I would like to mention the prologue of my book. It’s written from my heart and sums up my core beliefs about my art and life as follows:
To you, with a dance in your heart—the boy branded effeminate for wanting
To you, the girl who was forced to choose physics lessons over dance,
You, the 70-year-old, were made to feel too old to dance to the music.
to you, the young adult compelled to abandon dance at the altar of a god
a’serious’ career option; to you, the trans-man stigmatised out of dance; to you,
body-shamed into not swaying in public – may this dance be successful
yours – now and forever. “
Noor Anand Chawla pens lifestyle articles for various publications and her blog, www.nooranandchawla.com.