Shiva Shakti for Perth International Arts Festival
I had an exciting last minute job this week at the Regal Theatre in Subiaco for a performance for the Perth International Arts Festival. It was a contemporary Indian dance performance by the world-class Indian dance troupe the Daksha Sheth Dance Company. The show is best described for me by this quote:
Absolutely original – a stunning blend of martial arts, yoga and aerial with rhythmic overtones of classical Indian dance. there is a never-ending cascade of beautiful images. CLASSICAL FM (CANADA)The show was AMAZING!
The company had decided some body painting would add to their performance so we tried out some things and gave it a run-through but the body paint, even with sealer, didn’t hold up to a hot sweaty aerial performance. Also details of the snake we had planned for Isha, such as showing the underside of its belly twisting around were lost from further back in the theatre. It also didn’t show up so well under some of the low-lit parts of the show, even though the paint was a metallic body paint it just wasn’t contrasting enough with the skin to show up from a distance. I watched the show from the back a couple of times to see how it was working.
So we went with a gold glitter body tattoo and used alcohol based body inks for the black which lasted really well, standing up to sweat and rubbing from the rope in the aerial parts of the show and also it caught the lights much better but didn’t distract from the performance and staging as I thought it might initially. This also was better for time, after the initial application it only needed a bit of refreshing each night rather than redoing the whole thing for each performance.
And now I know what a langoti is!
And the makeup in action? It worked well with several costumes and different levels of lighting, sometimes being more obvious and sometimes more subtle. My favourite was in the red (gypsyish) skirt below when the work on Isha’s leg would show in flashes during her fast and furious dancing. Isha Sharvani is one of India’s premier dancers and is thrilling to see, she’s also a skilled aerialist, something I always love to watch. She has even appeared in a few Bollywood films too! Her mother, Daksha Sheth began the company and is the lead choreographer has many, many years of experience behind her, she was part of the performance only briefly but her grace and ability were so evident even in a few movements. She is pictured below on the left with Isha.
At first I wasn’t sure how much the makeup would add to the show. I watched the first 20 mins a few nights to see the effect but I really wanted to sit down from a good seat to take in the whole narrative (Thanks Kerrie for the VIP seats!). When I finally saw the full show on closing night I was blown away by the performance and really pleased with the makeup. It complemented the action and costumes really well and I felt really privileged to have been a part of a truly impressive world class event. It was incredible to watch.
More about the show from the PIAF website:
Traditional and contemporary Indian dance unite in a production of astounding beauty and incredible human skill. From the visionary and internationally acclaimed Daksha Sheth Dance Company, Shiva Shakti blasts Indian dance into the 21st century. Featuring Bollywood actress and one of India’s finest dancers Isha Sharvani, the performers explore the Kundalini Shakti present in each of us, connecting us in the dance of Shiva. With stunning aerial work set to seductive, powerful live music by Devissaro, composer of Tim Supple’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and his percussionist son Tao Issaro, experience Indian dance like never before.The section below was a very cool “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” style aerial battle with lots of real sounds of swords clashing! You can see the amazing light show in these shots too.
The picture below shows Isha (rising cobra-like) and her brother Tao on the drums who also gave a really impressive performance, the whole crew did, the whole thing was, as I said already A.MA.ZING!
Signing off now, I’ve run out superlatives 🙂
UPDATE: Photos from the show are currently on the front page of Daksha Sheth’s website here and a video is here.
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