Review: Shobana Jeyasingh Dance | Bayadere – The Ninth Life
Shobana Jeyasingh Dance
Choreographer & Concept: Shobana Jeyasingh
Set & Costume Design: Tom Piper
Music: Gabriel Prokofiev
Light Design: Fabiana Piccioli
Video Design: Sander Loonen
16th October 2017
Sadler Wells Theatre
Review by: Tamar Dixon – Unique Tay
Choreographer Shobana Jeyasingh explores the 19th century tangled love story of La Bayadère. La Bayadère’s main character is an Indian temple dancer, Nikiyia, who is in love with the warrior Solor. The king however, orders Solor to marry his daughter, the princess Gamzatti, who poisons Nikiyia. Her death leads Solor, to despair and ultimately self- destruction...
Through storytelling, postmodern dance, Indian classical dance (Bharatanatyam) and technology, Shobana embraces Marius Petipa’s 19th century, ballet, La Bayadère and his curiosity and fascination of Indian dancers.
A European Ballet set 19th century India.
The famous ballet first premiered in St Petersburg at the Bolshoi Theatre in 1877. It was set in Royal India and showcased powerful ballerinas, with hints of Indian cultural characteristics, this famous ballet portraying India had no Indian dancers performing on stage. Shobana’s genuine interest for La Bayadère sparks interest and inspiration to revisits Petipa’s work by flipping the table and including an Indian male dancer to play Nikiyia. Her Bayadère is performed by Sooraj Subramaniam.
As actor Adi Chugh first takes the stage, costumed in western business attire and set in a modern day hotel room. He expresses his frustrations and boredom, with slight noises and sounds of heavy traffic in the background. Chugh’s boredom fazes as he exchanges WhatsApp messages with his friend, who shares his own trip to watch the ballet, to see Bayadère . Chugh exchanged messages are skilfully projected on a big screen, enabling the audience to also watch Chugh’s first discovery of the Indian Temple dancer. As Chugh slowly gazes at his screen watching video performances of La Bayadère, he is stunned and surprised of the rich ballet of strong characters. As the audience is slowly but surely invited to witness Shobana’s modern version.
The usage of technology on stage
Through Chugh mobile phone we also watch each dancer enter showing off their individual distinct characteristics. Quite elegant, graceful and smooth. Where later Chugh somehow becomes the Indian temple dancer now performed by Subramaniam. The stage is flooded with the cast, who swifts through from left to right, as they push and pull Subramaniam on mobile frames. As he creates divine postures and poses on the frames he is still somewhat objectified.. First adored, fetishised, given such high esteem and then rejected, as his gestures are imitated, particularly with the use of fans.
As Shobana’s work continues, the pace gradually accelerates with exchanges of rapid, sharp bodily movements. The cast typically partner up like magnets, suddenly and consistently switching positions. With pauses, turns, lifts and floor work imitating animalistic movements like a peacock… While the Indian Temple dancer, Subramaniam blends her twisted love and revenge through classical ballet and Bharatantyam.
This one of a kind choreography was accompanied with a voice over, capturing the tensions on stage, taken from writer Theophile Gautier. The stage appearance was set quite modestly, designed by Tom Piper. The dark stage was deprived of objects apart of the mobile frames resembling temple shapes and the copper cables above like clouds. As the original La Bayadère was set in royal India, Piper attempt to sustain that royalty and imagery on stage, along with costuming the Indian temple dancer with traditional Indian attire, bejewelled with dazzling nose jewellery. In terms of design and technology, Sander Loonen, video designer, portrays a ballet dancer, who occasionally and delicately dances across the stage with the creative use of image filter effects, such as ‘negative’ and TV ‘static’.
Implementing the use technology and video as a tool to interact more closely with the audience and to enhance the audience’s experience is an innovative idea. Although, this usage left some gaps in my mind, struggling to comprehend the purpose of this idea, about a ballet set in the 19th century.
Cultural Appropriation
Shobana Jeyasingh Dance creates stimulating experiences to stage and site-specific locations of modern dance forms with her foundation rooted in Indian classical dance. Her work has been challenging, daring and inspired by the world around us. It is evident that dance is a piece of art, as Shobana expresses curiosity through dance.
La Bayadère represents how cultures can easily influence one another, be entwined through art and dance. However Shobana’s thought-provoking, enticing dance theatre Bayadere – The Ninth Life, somehow sheds light on the lack of Indian representations. She questions as an Indian woman how could La Bayadère retrieve so much praise, despite it imitating Indian dancers and gestures, with little to no recognition to where it originated from. Was La Bayadère blatant cultural appropriation or simply a gesture of admiration?
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Unique Tay