BHOPAL: A month-long workshop on ‘Mayurbhanj Chhau’ concluded with dance performances and dance drama ‘Garud Vahan’ on Sunday at Utkal Bhawan. The workshop was organised by Kriti Ballet and Performing Arts under the aegis of Chhau Nritya Akademi in association with Sangeet Natak Akademi.
In the performances, artistes presented some basics of Mayurbhanj Chhau including exercises, chali (tabka), movement on chhau bol and paran beautifully. The programme concluded with dance drama ‘Garud Vahan’ in the chhau style which was major attraction of the programme. Based on mythological tale, the dance drama talks about the saga of character ‘Garud’. It shows how he gets freed his mother Vinita from the slavery of his sister. The dance performances were choreographed by noted chauu choreographer Chandra Madhav Barik under the guidance of Sidhram Swami Korbar. It was presented by Vibha Shrivastava, Shalini Malviya, Puja Verma, Manisha Huariya, Nandini Chaurasiya, Suman Kothari, Rupal Sharma, Puja Sahu, Prakash Meena, Shivam Rathore, aashish Ojha, Sonu Saha, Prakash Gyakwad, Ambuj Thakur, Harish Sharma and Ramesh Ahire. Mayurbhanj Chhau dance form is originally a tribal dance of Odisha, which originated from the forests of Mayurbhanj in the 18th century and got the status of a martial art form in the 19th century. Slowly Mayurbhanj Chhau left its martial character and mellowed. Under the royal patronage it received proper attention and direction and showed a bright future and utmost perfection as a dance of excellent style in the field of eastern art and culture of India. It has highly evolved techniques of its own for which it differentiates itself from other forms of dance. These techniques of the dance are based on various body movements.
