'Nrityesvara Festival' to question gender roles in Indian classical dance

New Delhi, Sep 17 (PTI) An upcoming dance festival by the Centre for Cultural Studies and Development (CCSD) will provide a platform to budding as well as established male Indian classical dancers with an aim to question the prevalent gender roles in the ancient art form.

'Nrityesvara Festival, which will be held at Triveni Kala Sangam here on September 22, will host artists including Kuchipudi dancer Gururaju N from Bengaluru, Odissi dancer Krishnendu Saha from Udaipur, and Kathak exponent Vishavdeep from Delhi.

The dance festival will also see a seminar and discussion on the topic of "The challenges faced by the male artists and how to dismantle the gender binaries".

Talking about the dance event, Paulami Guha, an Odissi veteran and founder member secretary of CCSD, said that male dancers in India have to take up other jobs to sustain themselves, as classical dance is "not the most lucrative profession".

"This preconceived notion that classical dance is women-centric makes it more difficult for male dancers to survive. There are hardly any opportunities for men to perform and programme organisers, cultural festival promoters too are guilty of this gender bias," Guha said in a statement.

She added that even though there are two approaches to the classical dance tradition -- 'Tandava' that is vigorous and energetic and 'Lasya' that is delicate and graceful -- however; in the present context, "classical dance is often been misconceived as a style with exquisite movements which can be justified by only females".

"There have been many gurus (from across the gender spectrum) who have proved from time to time that art is beyond the confinements of gender identities. It is therefore an urgent need for us as a society to shed the rigid parameters of masculinity & femininity especially when our traditions that date back thousands of years were and are so gender fluid," Guha added.

The festival is supported by the Ministry of Culture. PTI MAH MG MG