Staying Connected #8 | Light Doesn’t Have Arms To Carry Us | Across, Not Over | May 23. 2020

In a world that's turned upside down for so many, can you imagine a performance devoid of elaborate set designs, narrative plots or ornate costumes? As we struggle and cope with this shock, how do we experience a bodily response to the poetry of silence? Or unearthing old and forging new relationships with the dancing body?

Take a seat and plunge into the work of two of our grantees who have explored these questions in their practice, long before the outbreak of the pandemic and lockdown. Bringing you Light Doesn’t Have Arms To Carry Us by Preethi Athreya and Across, Not Over by Vikram Iyengar today as part of the Staying Connected Series by India Foundation for the Arts (IFA). 

Light Doesn’t Have Arms To Carry Us by Preethi Athreya
This is a solo creation based on a composition for piano by French composer, Gerard Pesson. The music was inspired by the writings of Pierre Albert Jourdan, whose one-line poem La lumiere n’a pas de bras pour nous porter (Light Doesn’t Have Arms To Carry Us) forms the title of the musical composition. At times a silent film, at times an intimate conversation, at times a scenographic installation, this work proposes a way of interpreting the music which takes it out of the realm of auditory sensation and suggests other visual phenomena in which the music resides. Yet, the structure of the composition is all the time dictating the visual material created. Follow the link to experience this work. 

Preethi Athreya received a grant from India Foundation for the Arts (IFA), under the New Performance Programme for the creation of Light Doesn’t Have Arms To Carry Us.

Across, Not Over by Vikram Iyengar, choreographed by Preethi Athreya
A performance that engages with the Kathak dance form in an essentially material way. The work fragments the Kathak body and re-presents it in newly assembled poetics. It challenges the verticality of the form and the hierarchy of the feet. The exploration questions and re-frames notions of classicism and beauty by presenting the dancing body as an image of itself. Follow the link to watch the performance and find out more about the choreographic process.
 
Vikram Iyengar received a grant from India Foundation for the Arts (IFA), under the Arts Practice programme for the creation of Across, Not Over.