Company dancer Ashwin Kumar recounts his experience of working for The Dewarists Season 03 Finale with The Raghu Dixit Project. Read on…

 

As I sit to write this, I am a little confused as to where do I begin? DEWARISTS! There was so much that went into the entire process of the final output that it leaves me a little overwhelmed and gives me chills when I watch the video.

We started experimenting with the idea of what is illusion and what is reality, and if the two can exist together. As simple as it sounds, it was as much difficult to dance it out. More than dance it out, to feel it.

Mayuri, the choreographer, wanted to explore 2 sides of a man, the good and the evil and how the good gets sucked into the evil and becomes one of them. She tried exploring the today’s man in this busy rushing times and what the emotions/feelings he goes through in the journey of life, most emotions bringing out his darker side. To this context she added characters like Arjuna and Krishana from our mythology. Arjuna, being the common man.

The music scored by Raghu Dixit was apt for the sequence that we were trying to build on. Usually the choreographic material is created and then the music is composed for it. But in this case we had the music scored already and we have to work on it, which made it a little easier as there was a base structure to work on.

We had masks for the sequence made by Sridhar Murthy. Our faces were half covered with the mask, again exploring the idea of illusion and reality.

Personally what was really challenging for me was to emotionally connect to the piece, as it was not just physical movements but to bring out the real dark side of a man. Mayuri really pushed me to the limits of me digging inside myself and bringing out the emotion she wanted to feel watching us dance. It took most dancers a little time to get the emotion right and bring out what really she was expecting to create out of us.

Another very interesting thing to the entire concept was that she wanted us to be painted and not wear any costumes, this aspect really added the cherry on the cake. It brought out the concept of illusion and really out very well.

Working with a team of professionals at the Infinite Soul Farm And Artiste’s Retreat and then at KH Kala Soudha was a fun experience. Though the shoot was carried out in a limited time period, we did not miss out on the fun aspect whether it was over yummy food at Infinite Souls or assist in removing paint from co-dancer Niranjan’s body for the numerous retakes!

Since we had to finish the shoot in two days, we had to work really hard and push ourselves to get the final output. Roll,Camera Dance and Cut! it was.  The movements were shot in different angles to see what would look the best on camera. And when we saw the final output, it gave chills to most of us. We were proud, happy, excited to see what was on screen.

A production worth a lifetime experience!