‘Shall we dance? A curtain raiser on the Attakkalari Interim Festival

The Attakkalari Interim Festival to be held between February 1 and 10 in Bengaluru promises to be important for the contemporary dance and movement arts in India and South Asia.

Here is a curtain raiser of the event with Jayachandran Palazhy, Director of Attakkalari, who gives us all the details of the dance festival this year…

YS Weekender: Can you tell us about the Attakalari Interim Festival?

Jayachandran Palazhy: In keeping with Attakkalari’s tradition of spreading the reach of contemporary movement arts and providing a platform for cutting edge innovative practices across the globe, this festival presents a multitude of international performances and trans-disciplinary partnership projects at the Rangashankara Theatre and Attakkalari Studios in Bengaluru.

YSW: What are the highlights of the festival? 

JP: With the contemporary dance community growing steadily in India, the festival will focus on creating opportunities to produce thought-provoking and original work. It will also witness groundbreaking performances and collaborative projects from Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Canada, Spain, Britain, France and Korea.

YSW: Who are some of the artistes taking part in this edition? 

JP: The festival opens with “Situation with Doppelgänger”, a performance by Julian Warner and Oliver Zahn from Germany, which is the focus country for the Attakkalari Interim Festival 2019. Andrea Peña and Company from Canada looks at resilience, Switzerland’s CocoonDance explores rhythm and speed, and Spain’s Daniel Abreu Company investigates the concept of construction and destruction. The exciting line-up of performances at the festival has something for everyone!

YSW: Can you tell us about the launch of the incubation centre?

JP: Attakkalari will launch an exciting new initiative, the Incubation Centre for the Arts and Media (ICAM) to provide opportunities for artists to engage in transdisciplinary explorations involving dance and performing arts. Leveraging the fast-evolving ecology of creative entrepreneurship of Bengaluru and the presence of an increasing number of arts practitioners from the city’s diverse backgrounds, ICAM will help to forge creative collaborations and partnerships among artists and organisations.

YSW: Tell us about the beginning of Attakalari. 

JP: Attakkalari Centre for Movement Arts is the lead organisation working in the field of contemporary dance in India today. Since its inception in 2001, it made huge contributions in developing the country’s contemporary dance scene, particularly in the realm of festivals, dance pedagogy, physical performance, choreography and stage technologies. As an organisation invested in exchanges and collaborations, Attakkalari has developed strategic partnerships and produced many international arts events. It successfully brought together knowledge and wisdom from Indian physical and performance traditions with information and skills created elsewhere in the world. 

 YSW: What is the Youth Dance project? 

JP: It is a series of courses in multiple strands of contemporary dance, Yoga, Kalarippayattu, Bharatanatyam, Kathak and many other disciplines. Students get an opportunity to train in these forms and also get to perform with full technical support at ADA Rangamandira on May 5 this year. The admissions are already open and aspiring dancers, regardless of their age, will get the best out of this course. 

YSW: How are tastes in forms of dance evolving? 

JP: All dance forms are to be viewed as multiple facets of the same idea. Today, young people want to have the special skills and approaches offered by contemporary dance as that training allows them to venture into any form of dance or physical activity with confidence and aplomb.

YSW: Can anyone learn to dance? How can it change your life? 

JP: Yes, everybody has a dancer within. You just need to give yourself that chance to bring the dancer in you to the fore. Dance enhances brain plasticity, opens up new neural channels and helps with cognition, memory and imagination. Apart from gaining and nourishing a healthier body, mind and spirit, taking up dance will fine tune all your faculties, enabling you to enjoy life in the fullest sense. 

YSW: What are your plans for the future? 

JP: We want to maintain the best quality for ourselves as well as for the people we work with or for.