International Odissi Festival 2011: Madhulita Mohapatra performs Prana Sangini Re
Director: Kelucharan Mohapatra
Duration: 00:13:00; Aspect Ratio: 1.778:1; Hue: 13.753; Saturation: 0.216; Lightness: 0.060; Volume: 0.133
Summary: The 4th International Odissi Dance Festival in 2011 was held from December 23 to 30, 2011, at Rabindra Mandap Bhubaneswar. The festival was preceded by an attempt to create a world record by having around 550 dancers perform together at Kalinga Stadium. It saw the participation of most major Odissi ensembles in Orissa and a few from outside the state. With performances for over twelve hours each day, the festival featured several hundred performers in solo, duet and group works over eight days. In its scale, the festival offered a bird's eye view of the landscape of contemporary Odissi and its ever-changing nature. It foregrounded new trends in choreography, music and costuming. The seminars during the festival sparked lively debates on issues and concerns in Odissi. One such concern, voiced repeatedly, questioned the definition of tradition within the space of the dance form and the limits it could be stretched to. This raised parallel questions about innovation and experimentation in Odissi - a debate that found itself mirrored in the performances during the festival.
Madhulita Mohapatra is an Odissi dancer and teacher based in Bangalore. She trained under Guru Krishna Chandra Sahoo, followed by a period of training at Orissa Dance Academy in Bhubaneswar. She has also studied the folk dances of Sambalpur. She runs a dance school and performance unit, Nrityantar, in Bangalore.
Here, she performs Prana Sangini Re, an Oriya abhinaya composed by Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra in 1976. Radha is deeply embarrassed about the prank Krishna has played on her; the morning after, she recounts the incident to her sakhi. The music is by Balakrishna Das.
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