Women and Performing arts - Dance: Significance: are all-pervading bringing colour and joy to numerous festivals and ceremonies.
There are tribal belts throughout India and although each tribe has its own dance form, they all share a similar form, with men and women forming separate rows with linked arms and executing intricate leg movements in a gradually increasing tempo that builds up to a crescendo of vigor.Dance in India has had a long and chequered history: from being seen as sacred and spiritual to getting proscribed for being perceived as profane, debauched and carnal. Women and their role during colonial Era:-
1. Early phase – British equated dancers to nautch girls - The enchantment component degraded with time making dance performance vulgar for British audience loosing aesthetic standards of dance as art form.
2. In South India devadasi was considered as equivalent to legalized Prostitution and The Anti-Nautch Bill passed in 1911, finally proscribed (बहिष्कार करना) the Sadir dance (solo dance form of devadasis) and abolished the devadasi institution.
3. Revival of their art as “classical” traditional dance as part of nationalist movement which sought to bestow “dignity” and “integrity” to Indian culture, be it in art, sculpture, music or dance to counter colonial allegations of moral degradation.
4. Indian dance was gradually gaining visibility from the beginning of the 20th century. Ex revival of the Sadir form - Rukmini Devi Arundale, who founded the Kalakshetra, a new format called the Bharatnatyam infusing into it the basic tenets of the rasa theory.
5. Poet Vallathol reformed Kathakali and Madame Menaka refashioned Kathak
6. Modern dance in India revolutionised or democratised gender aspects.
7. In Bengal Tagore bestowed the status of art to dance by including and promoting dance in Santiniketan.
8. Men in the performance arena were great embarrassment for the Bengali gentry.
Tagore’s views and efforts:-
1. Initially Tagore seemed to have held little regard for public dance performers.
2. Later he bestowed the status of art to dance and promoted it in his university [curriculum since 1920s].
3. Advocated teaching of dance to both male and female students - women from respectable households were cast in roles where they were required to dance on stage before an audience.
4. Brought foreign dance (ballet) and dances from other region (Manipuri) to his university.
5. Geetotsav were organized, dance was helped them to liberate their bodies from gender inscribed bodies.
6. Folkdances play a major role in national integration hence need preservation and promotion.
Discuss the Lasya dance as recorded in the early Indian inscriptions.
According to Natyasastra, an ancient treatise of music and drama, Lasya was the dance performed by Goddess Parvati in response to the male energy of the cosmic dance of Tandava performed by Lord Shiva. Some examples of Lasya are Mohiniyattam, Manipuri, Kathak, Bharatnatyam, Kuchipudi, Odissi, Rass Nritya of Mathura also known as Halisak or Dand Rasak.Three types of Lasya Nritya are practised today:
1. Vikat Lasya – dance in which Laya, Taal and Bhavas are exhibited.
2. Visham Lasya – special footwork in Laya based dance.
3. Laghu Lasya – by producing sound on earth through anklets.
Salient Features:
1. In Lasya instruments with soft sound, high bass are used: Manjira, Ghungroo, Anklets, Hold, and Tabla.
2. In Lasya costumes used are extremely shringarik and attractive. The hands and necks are adorned with petals and flowers.
Indian temples are adorned with Apsaras. Barhut and Sanchi stupas also have a number of dance scenes involving women.
3 style of temple arch:
Nagara or the Northern style- bw Himalayas and Vindhyas
Sikhara (beehive shaped tower)
Khajuraho Group of temples, Sun temple, Konark
Sun temple at Modhera, Gujarat
Ossian temple, Gujarat
Dravida or the Southern style- bw Krishna and Kaveri
- enclosures arnd temples & Gopurams (huge gateways); pyramidal Vimana
- Kailasanatha T, Kanchi -jv of Rajasimha or Narasimhavarman II and son Mahendra III
- Tanjore, Madurai, Mahabalipuram, Badami, Pattadakal
Vesara or Mixed style- bw Vindhyas and the Krishna
- Papanatha temple (680 AD); reduced height of temple towers
- started by Chalukyas of Badami (500-735 AD)
- refined by Rashtrak of Manyakheta (750-983AD) in Ellora, Chaluk of Kalyani (983-1195AD)
- epitomized by the Hoysalas (1000-1330 AD)
8C onward- sophisticated rituals- more mandapas/corridors and 1000s pillared halls
Pallava Per ‘rock-cut’ => ‘monolithic structure’ => ‘multilithic temples’ => modern arch
- Source: Sthapatya Veda (Vastu and Shilpa Shastras): Early Medv Period texts
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