May 13 2023 to May 13 2023 7 p.m.

EVENT HAS ENDED

Where

Shoonya - Centre for Art and Somatic Practices

4th Floor, Rear Wing, Brahmananda Court, 37, Lal Bagh Main Road 560027

Event Description

About the Choreographer

Papia Chakraborty is an independent contemporary dancer and choreographer based in Kolkata. She has done her diploma in movements art from the Rythmosaic Dance Institute and a certificate course in choreographic approach from the Gati Dance Forum in Delhi. Her choreographic work is inspired by my immediate surroundings and addresses the issues of gender identity, human emotions, and the climate change crisis. Her movement explorations are inspired by surrounding behavioral patterns, martial art, and sports activities.

Metamorphosis – Intention

Metamorphosis is inspired by recent incidents in the choreographer's life. Chakraborty has worked on the essence of what impacted her through these incidents and the core of the subject rather than portraying the incident itself; With an intention to have the audience connect to the piece through their own perspective of the subject.

This piece has been selected for PECDA 2022. 

Metamorphosis – Synopsis

What really determines a person’s true identity- who the person really is? Is it one’s emotions, personal beliefs, values, hormonal urges, kinks, likes and dislikes,s and love language that make her unique? Or is it solely defined by social standards imposed upon her? Or is her identity a restless jumble of the two? Most of us lead a good part of our lives enmeshed in our comfortable cocoons labeled work, family, social life, and sleep. The rinse-repeat formula works too, that is until something comes to shake things up. You lose someone or something you love and life as you knew it becomes a stranger. You become a stranger. And those questions posited above become loud. It's time for the caterpillar to wake up from her hibernation. To realize that she is more than just the mundane identity lent to her by society. It's time to seek out a path that is hers alone.

Introduction

The piece looks closely into what happens when one goes through the transformation process - What transitions does one face? What exactly does a caterpillar go through in the cocoon phase before becoming a butterfly? Often, to cope with a certain circumstance, situation, environment, person, or feeling, we acquire certain patterns in order to fit in or adjust. Sometimes, these patterns become an intrinsic part of our lives that we do not even realize the line between an acquired pattern and our true self. When certain circumstances change and those changes shake the roots of your life, you find yourself questioning these patterns that don’t seem to fit or serve you any longer.

The Body of Metamorphosis- The duo explores the reactions that take place within the body while it tries to fit into a pattern. How does a pattern impact the body? And during the period of transition when old patterns are fading away and the new self is finding its expression in the world, what is then your relationship to the changed self, and how does your body respond to this change? In this duet movement piece, the choreographer emphasizes the transformation of a personality from one to another. What is this new self? Is it an add-on to the old pattern or a breakaway into something new? The choreographer continues to explore the shift between reality and illusion. What does the body sense and feel and how does it react through this unending loop between creation of a new pattern, destruction of it, and recreation of another; Or is it a pattern at all?