THE Calcutta-based Pickle Factory Dance Foundation is set to showcase eight curated short dance films at this year’s Jomba! Contemporary Dance Experience.
The online festival is from August 24 to September 5. The Pickle Factory will feature on the Indian Crossings Platform of the programme.
A press release said their films expressed an evocative interpretation of the festival’s theme, Border Crossings, and speak to the zeitgeist of contemporary Indian dance making and its relationship to film and screen.
Vikram Iyengar and Kunal Chakraborty have co-curated their programme for Jomba!, titled I m/Material.
Iyengar is the founder and director of the foundation. He is also a dancer-choreographer-director, curator-presenter, and arts researcher-writer. Chakraborty is a film-maker and the project manager for the foundation.
In an interview with the POST, Chakraborty said that while curating the Jomba! 2021, they wanted to keep the palate as broad and inclusive as possible.
“We pondered over the questions of border crossings, which forms the basis of JOMBA 2021. And that single word (border) has a huge connotation in India, given our long colonial history that was followed by even more complexities in the post colonial era. The themes are varied and are also intricately interwoven with one another. There definitely are women issues, which get even more varied treatments based on the lens they are looked through.”
Iyengar said that was the first showcase of Indian dance films for Jomba! And they were aware of the definition of “Indian” they would be putting across.
“Especially in terms of dance, the reputation abroad tends to be exotic and traditional, or Bollywood. Neither of these is adequate or true to the variety of dance and movement expressions in this very pluralistic country. So, one of our key ideas was to reflect this range in the work we selected.
“In terms of themes, Jomba! had already proposed Border Crossings, and that keeps coming up in many ways – inter-culturally, between (dance) forms, sometimes more philosophically. Alongside, we are also trying to problematise the notion of the ‘contemporary’: What can the term mean in a country of many cultures and many approaches to life? One of the major themes running through is the materiality of the body itself as it engages with the materiality outside of it – this space of flux and possibility gives the selection its amorphous name: I m/Material.”
Commenting on dance and film as art forms, and their ability to transcend borders universally – be it physical, cultural and language borders and so on, Chakraborty said both the art forms were visual in nature.
“Both have movement associated with them (for cinema it is moving images). While dance has existed for thousands of years, cinema is relatively nascent. But both were born out of the innate need to express. And then comes our role: How do we want to see? How do we want to move? Can we transcend the billions of boundaries and borders that have existed for years and are still continuing to do so? For me, these art forms can pose these questions to not just think through but also act accordingly.”
Iyengar said one of the key differences between watching dance live and watching it on film was the element of the viewer’s choice.
“In a live experience, I choose what to focus on in the performance. I direct my gaze. In a film, the camera does a lot of that for me: there is a lot I do not see, and that affects the communication and interpretation. For the artists making the work, choice again becomes vital. What they choose to foreground through the camera and how, is central to building the relationship with the viewer.
“Dance and film play with space and time very differently, and it’s always exciting to see these very different approaches in conversation with each other – agreeing, challenging, subverting – with the moving body as a focus.”
The Covid-19 pandemic has challenged the continuation of the arts, particularly with limited-to-no hosting of live performances.
Iyengar said: “In many places, definitely in India, we have suffered invisibly. Speaking both as a performing artist and as Pickle Factory director, the live experience is irreplaceable and we must find ways to return to it safely, not just look at digital as the only way forward now. The digital avenue should be a new option to explore and exist in a positive fallout of a negative time.
“We also need to be acutely aware of access: while going digital does open doors to the world, it also shuts out a huge swathe of audiences locally who may not have regular and reliable access to the internet. This is another border to cross and blur together – and it cannot be done by just modifying the strategies and models we already know (whether live or digital).
“Many artists are already doing this, coming up with unimaginable and provocative ideas and directions. But many artists are also transferring to the digital without enough thought. It’s not a bandwagon to climb on to blindly. We need to ask ourselves why and how we should go digital, and who we need to take with us on the journey. Every answer to this will be different, according to the ethos and values we live, make, and present work by.”
Chakraborty said the collaboration between the various art forms was not new.
“It has been existing for quite some time and is one of the reasons behind the evolution of art forms. What’s new, is the medium of dissemination. And that is hugely affected. Cinema has always been heavily dependent on technology… In terms of projection as well, digital is the most used form with exceptions. The new factor here is how it is reaching the end user. The scope to watch it on giant screens has become limited. And there’s a ballooning market of mobiles and tabs.
“But for live art forms like dance or theatre there has been a complete shift in terms of the production and it is far more difficult. However, the common binding factor in both the cases is the chance to watch these with a few hundreds around, unknown to each other and sharing an invisible bond. I don’t think anyone can tell us where the arts is headed. We just have to wait and watch but be ready and responsible with our actions.”
The Pickle Factory Dance Foundation will present a works and collaborations from Lubdhak Chatterjee, Dr Pompi Paul, Hediyeh Azma, Sumedha Bhattacharyya, Preethi Athreya, Sharan Devkar Shankar, Gia Singh Arora and Mukta Nagpal, among others.
More from the Pickle Factory Dance Foundation here.
