26 days left until DanceWeekend!

Our countdown to DanceWeekend’22 continues with Harikishan S Nair!

Harikishan S Nair will be performing Sunday July 17 at 4:45pm on the #DanceWeekend stage.

www.harikishansnair.com

FB: @harikishansnairr

IG: @harikishansnair

TW: @HarikishanNair

Can you tell us a little bit about yourself/your company?

I am an exponent of the south Indian classical dance styles of Kuchipudi, Bharatanatyam and Mohiniyattam.

I perform, choreograph and teach extensively in Toronto, Canada and Internationally. I began my dance training at age 3 under the tutelage of renowned Guru Girija Chandran in Bharatanatyam and Mohiniyattam.

I learnt Kuchipudi under the guidance of Guru Geetha Krishnakumar and Guru Bijula, themselves disciples of world-renowned exponent Guru Padmabhushan Dr. Vempatti Chinna Sathyam.

These three forms are all expressed through a grounded body attending to strict rhythmic combinations and all of their cannons have items that work through the aesthetic practice of abhinaya; expressional pieces where the dancer is also actor, detailing stories and scenarios that hold a paradox of being both abstract

and concrete. However, all three forms hold different aesthetic and repertoire traditions. Bharatanatyam is perhaps the best-known style in the diaspora communities offering a regal geometry of body/space that is executed with a bright sharpness. Mohiniyattam maintains a fluid circularity that pulses through the body in exquisite waves while Kuchipudi flows in spherical permutations that increase in speed and rhythmic complexity to create a taught heightened energy for the dancer and audience.

Since moving from India to Toronto 9 years ago, I have worked independently and with established dance companies as a dancer and choreographer. During the last few years, I have had the privilege of working with extraordinary choreographers, new collaborators from different disciplines/dance genres as well as established teachers and senior artists in my professional career. I am now at an exciting point in my artistic practice where I desire to explore contemporary themes of my own curiosity and new methods of working (for me) in a process that is situated in my trainings but expand out of purely classical or repertoire works.

What will you be sharing at DanceWeekend’22?

THRAYAM
Thrayam simply means Three.
Here it is a presentation of the excerpts from 3 different work using the vocabularies of 3 Indian Classical dance forms- Mohiniyattam, Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi
This presentation is an exploration of the commonalities and differences of the dancing bodies within their respective dance forms, complimenting each other and conversing through the medium of their respective dance vocabulary.
Choreography by Harikishan S Nair
Dancers-
  1. Ananya Kishore
  2. Shivankari Segarajasingham
  3. Ramya Kannan
  4. Luxmy Rajah
  5. Aishwarya Menon
  6. Karuna Ramkumar
  7. Pratyusha Dwibhashi
  8. Vishnupriya Ganesh
  9. Arun Sreekumar
  10. Suhi Vasagam
  11. Mithunan Raveendran
  12. Rohit Tyagi

How has the pandemic shifted your work as a professional dance artist?

Pandemic has given me the time and space to deepen my knowledge in many different ways around many different things. As a professional dancer it has taught me to think about making art possible and accessible even when the whole world shuts down. Pandemic has taught to make contingency plan for the art to exist.

Please share what you are most looking forward to at Dance Ontario’s return to live performances at DanceWeekend?

I am looking forward to sharing space with other artist, to be performing on stage

for a live audience.

Do you have any up-coming performances/workshops/events you would like to share?

Travelling to Yukon for an installation work by Anandam Dancetheatre , where I work as the Associate Artistic Director

In 1 or 2 sentences, what does dance mean to you?

Dance means everything to me.. I live, eat and breathe dance….


Photos by Ken Dobb