Sky Dancers explores the rich energy of stillness through bharatanatyam and meditation
At The Dance Centre, Anusha Fernando directs an expressive piece born from a year’s worth of nonhierarchical gatherings
Sky Dancers. Photo by Yasuhiro Okada
The Dance Centre presents Shakti Dance Society’s Sky Dancers from October 4 to 6 at the Scotiabank Dance Centre as part of the Global Dance Connections series
HIERARCHICAL STRUCTURES ARE deeply embedded within human society, whether they be as large-scale as King Charles III heading Canada’s constitutional monarchy, or as simple as a store owner delegating tasks to their employees. In the realm of art, oftentimes a hierarchy involves one person acting as the director of a production, wherein the artists involved carry out their vision, follow their directions, and apply their corrections.
But what if dance didn’t have to abide by a hierarchical structure? It’s a question that Anusha Fernando began contemplating one day after asking herself how her own creative experiences could help others. As a bharatanatyam practitioner and artistic director of Shakti Dance Society, she has been firmly grounded in Vancouver’s South Asian dance scene since 1995, and has spent plenty of time teaching emerging dancers. She began to realize that the Indian classical dance community lacked mentorship training for the transition from being a student and carving out a career path as an artist.
After receiving a Canada Council for the Arts grant to bridge that gap in 2022, she brought together five professional bharatanatyam artists—Arno Kamolika, Kiruthika Rathanaswami, Malavika Santhosh, Ashvini Sundaram, and Sujit Vaidya—and over the next year, they engaged in weekly group gatherings. They were nonhierarchical in nature, and provided a space free of leadership or competition, where the dancers could converse with equal value, share resources, and support the exploration of each other’s foundational training.
Adjusting to the lack of structure did take some time at first, Fernando tells Stir. “It’s not so easy to not have hierarchical framework,” she says by phone. “It’s really a process to listen to other people and to engage in those things….So there’s been a need for patience, listening, and faith that it’s all going to gel together. And I think that comes out of there not being a dominant voice. Having this kind of open-ended, flexible vision requires a lot of faith that something will come forward. And for me, it’s beautiful because it has come forward.”
Sky Dancers. Photo by Yasuhiro Okada
After that first year of gathering, Fernando applied for another grant so the artists could begin developing a piece together. Sky Dancers emerged over the following year and a half, based on the framework of the dakini (a form which translates from Sanskrit as “sky dancer”). The full-length piece is premiering at The Dance Centre from October 4 to 6.
“The dakini is basically just a way of representing energy in the universe, in all of its rich and diverse forms,” Fernando explains. “So it could be nurturing, it could be fierce, it could be confident, it could be sensual. And these are all aspects that we develop within our own dance form.”
There are five different dakinis embodied in Sky Dancers, each with a different name, based on Fernando’s research of poetic traditions: the lively Tree Leaf, ephemeral and expansive Wings of Breath, beautifully lithe Blissful Diamond, commanding Lion Face, and death-interrogating Corpse Raising. Dakini vignettes throughout the piece are joined together by traditional Buddhist chants, such as the well-known Heart Sutra, which is said to depict a fundamental reimagining of wisdom.
Dancers Kamolika, Rathanaswami, Santhosh, Sundaram, and Vaidya are joined for the performance by shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute) player Alcvin Ryuzen Ramos, percussionist Curtis Andrews, and a troupe of six live meditators and chanters. Fernando serves as facilitator and director. The musicians and chanters sit still onstage, referencing the energy of a meditation hall as the different dakinis flow between them. It’s an element that draws upon Fernando’s experience with zazen, a seated meditation practice from within Zen Buddhism.
“I actually conceived of the piece in some ways during the pandemic,” Fernando says. “I was fascinated by how, in Buddhist monasteries, they were live-streaming people meditating in meditation halls. And lots of people were looking into the YouTube screen to see these still bodies and getting some kind of solace out of just watching stillness. And as a dancer, I think most dancers explore the idea of what stillness is in all of its rich energy and movement. So for me, putting that on stage was really important.”
Fernando often explores the interdisciplinary potential of bharatanatyam within her practice; take, for example, her piece Gods, Demons and Yogis, which wove dance movement with North Indian classical music, storytelling, and martial arts. One of the performers in the work was the late Colleen Lanki, a practitioner of the classical Japanese dance form nihon buyoh and artistic director of TomoeArts. Gods, Demons and Yogis was eventually transformed into a CBC Radio play.
Sky Dancers breaks the mold in a similar way. Bringing a collaborative choreography process to bharatanatyam—which Fernando calls a “beautiful, rich form” with a “deep palette of expression” and “sophisticated rhythmic language”—has amplified its stylings in bold new ways.
“A lot of traditional training is very much about obliterating the self and allowing the tradition to come through,” Fernando says, “which has a lot of value as well—but here we were also asking that people came forth with their own personal voice….And I think that’s what’s beautiful and strong about the show.” 
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