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"I am creating my own idiom"
FROM painting to acting, and from
acting to dancing, Navtej Singh Johar finally found his
metier in dance. The love for Bharatanatyam took him to
Madras, where he underwent rigorous training under the
tutelage of Anandi Ramachandran, Sarada Hoffman, Ambica
Butch and Balagopal at Rukmini Devi Arundales dance
academy, Kalakshetra. He was further trained by
Leela Samson at the Sri Ram Bhartia Kala Kendra, New
Delhi. Surprisingly, Navtej does not remember how he felt
on the eve of his arangetram maiden performance on
stage. Perhpas it went off too smoothly for him. Not the
kind to be content with following conventions, he began
experimenting quite early in his career. A couple of
years later he left for the US where, apart from becoming
a sought after Bharatanatyam soloist, he also danced for
Bill T. Jones, Peter Sparling, Yoshiko Chuma, Alan
Lommasson, John Shack, and Janet Lilly, as well as with
the artistes of the New York City Opera.
His collaboration with
the University of Michigan composer, Stephen Rush, won
their team a Kellogs grant. In India he has worked with
Shubha Mudgal, Chandralekha and Leela Samson. Since he
likes to part his knowledge with others, he taught at the
School of Sacred Arts, New York, for four years, and
later at the Telluride Academy for the Arts, Colorado,
Interlochen Centre for the Arts, Michigan, National
School of Drama, and the National Institute of Fashion
Technology. He now teaches modern dance at the Natya
Ballet Centre, New Delhi. Excerpts of an interview with Kuldip Dhiman.
l Since classical dancers follow very
strict strictures, do you have any freedom to improvise?
When I began learning
Bharatanatyam about 10 year ago, I often felt I was
getting into a groove, and even my friends used to ask me
if what I was doing wasnt repetitive, if I
didnt get bored with it. In those days I used to
move around with people who were into modern art, and I
went through a stage when I considered conditioning of
any kind as regressive. Now I realise that it was a very
hollow kind of philosophy.
Though Bharatanatyam has
its conventions, there is definitely room for
improvisation. But this should happen in stages. In the
early stages it is very important to do as you are
taught; it is absolutely necessary, because this is a
system of education where you learn by imitation, and I
think this must be maintained in order to keep the
tradition alive. It takes about five years to know the
inner dynamics of the different pieces or the different
styles. You have the thillana, the varnam, the
kirtanam all these have inner system, inner
logic, inner dynamics, and they all work in their own
way, and it is very important that you begin to
understand them from the inside. These things cannot be
taught, they have to be given to you in a tightly sealed
unit that has to be repeated again and again and again
till it becomes a part of your being. Once you grasp the
format, of the units and the diametrical opposed units
within the style, you can progress to the next stage and
start improvising.
lIs training in classical music
necessary for a dancer?
Absolutely. You must
learn music so that you have sur gyan. You have to
learn the taalams vocally since it is almost
imperative to sing the piece before you dance to it. Your
mind has to precisely know where the punctuation is, and
where the metre is, where the tension is and where the
release is. You have to really, really know music to the
depths of your soul so that your body responds to it
naturally.
lSince most of the songs used in
Bharatanatyam are Tamil, Kannada, or Telugu, did you have
to learn these languages in order to do justice to your
dance?
No, I dont know
all these languages, though I have working knowledge of
Tamil. I might take the help of a Tamil, Kannada or
Telugu speaker, but just knowing the words is pointless
if you dont have a feel for the poetry, if you
dont understand the import of the poetry. You have
to feel the poetry in your bones.
lBefore taking up dance, you were into
street theatre, How did that happen?
I was in my second year
at college. At that point I knew that my leaning was
towards the arts. In those days I wanted to be a painter,
so I took fine art as my subject. Then I saw a poster
announcing Channis theatre workshop, and I jumped
at the opportunity to learn theatre. Later I took part in
a lot of street plays such acclaimed plays as Disturbed
Area.
lDid that experience help you in your
dance career?
I was very fortunate to
do street theatre first rather than conventional theatre
because it didnt have the pressures and
restrictions of conventional theatre-pressures that I
detested. Street theatre was very liberating. In street
theatre you are really in touch with the audience. The
audience participation is very strong.
lYou say that you detested the pressures
and restrictions of conventional theatre. How, then, do
you reconcile with Bharatanatyam an art from this
is traditional, formal, and to a large extent rigid?
Well, Bharatanatyam may
be rigid to you, to me it is not. No classical form is
rigid. Let men answer this in parts. The actual moment of
performance doesnt change; the experience of
performance doesnt change; it might become more
focussed, more intense, more specialised, but the actual
coming together of the performer and the audience remains
quite consistent, be it in on stage, in circus, in temple
or in the street. After a while I quit theatre because
although I liked it, I realised that theatre did not
express my needs. It was not complete for me, it was not
liberal enough, and above all it lacked spirituality.
Spirituality was important to me because I knew my body
had something that wanted expression, something that
words cannot express.
lWhat made you take up Bharatanatyam and
not Kathak or Odissi?
It was a personal choice
although I waited for a year. I shopped around to see
which style to choose, as I had no clue. I went through
Kathak, Odissi, Kuchipudi, Manipuri, Kathakali. Had I
been exposed to Kathakali first, I would have taken it up
because I like it very much. Then one day I saw a
Bharatanatyam performance and I knew it was going to be
Bharatanatyam for me.
l Did you face any opposition from your
parents, friends?
Yes, but I somehow
explained my needs very clearly and managed to convince
my parents. They soon realised that I was dead serious,
and that it was a real need in me, that I wasnt
being rebellious for the sake of it.
l You have been experimenting with
Bharatanatyam and other modern dance forms with some
western dancers, much to the dislike of puritans.
Whats all the fuss about?
I am experimenting with
my own style, a modern Indian style, which is suited to
the Indian body, Indian imagination. I am creating my own
idiom. Justin McCarthy, a modern dancer, and I took
Bharatanatyam and pushed it to its limits to express our
own needs, our own sensibilities. We are contemporaries,
we also think alike, we have very similar responses to
what we see around us, what we like and what we want
dance to become.
l Is it fusion of sorts?
I think fusion is a word
that journalists should stop using. To us it is a
four-letter word. What I am experimenting with is not
fusion at all. Iam extending what I have, what my body
has. I am not mixing it with other art forms in order to
universalise it. On the contrary, I am trying to make it
more individualised. I am taking Bharatanatyam through my
body and making it into a Navtej Singh Johar style. I am
doing it because my body at this moment, in this
condition, would like to move in this direction only. So
I am not trying to mix it with something else, I am
pushing it beyond its conventional limits. Period.
l After having performed for so many
years, is there any performance that stands out in your
memories?
One of my most enjoyable
performances was done in collaboration with Sheba
Chhachhi last year at the National Centre for Performing
Arts, Bombay. It was titled Becoming Meena, and it
was inspired by Meena Kumaris life. It was a very
powerful performance, and it was hugely popular. It was
my response to Meena Kumari, her work, her imagery. She
has influenced me a lot as performer; I adore that woman.
In one of the sequences I danced on broken glass. I was
bare bodied, the glass-pieces were placed very carefully,
but I did get a few cuts over my body
lPakeezah?
No, no, it had nothing
to do with Pakeezah, there was no connection with Pakeezah.
It didnt even come to my mind.
l Being an ex-theatre actor, do you
empathise with the character you are portraying?
Absolutely, why else
would you do it? Let me elaborate a little: I dont
empathise with the character, but I long to be the
character. I long to lose my self in the character,
because to me they are not characters but conditions.
l In classical dance forms like
Bharatanatyam, you have shringar rasa, veer
rasa, shaant rasa, but why is humour
missing?
This is a very
interesting question. Humour did go out of fashion for
sometime, but now it is coming back. Comic relief is part
of Indian classical tradition. For instance, we have
something called ninda stuti. We at times make fun
of the gods. To Lord Ganesha we might say that you are so
big, and you ride a mouse. I remember making the audience
laugh at times. We have the need to laugh. We are trying
to bring humour back.
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