"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 Arundale’s 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 wasn’t repetitive, if I didn’t 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 don’t 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 don’t have a feel for the poetry, if you don’t 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 Channi’s 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 didn’t 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 doesn’t change; the experience of performance doesn’t 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 wasn’t 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. What’s 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 Kumari’s 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 didn’t 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 don’t 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.