Dance Scholar Dr. Arushi Singh dives into the historical and cultural context of three Contemporary Indian artists who are engaging with their own cultural inheritances as a vital aspect of reclaiming identity on their own terms.
Video links:
Inside the Pillow Lab: Hari Krishnan/inDANCE (2024) https://youtu.be/rS1QWdC771E?si=RDdlOkle16g-EGQD
Inside the Pillow Lab: Aakash Odedra (2024) https://youtu.be/7rFjqCfVd78?si=ZdqRw1FqXUlyg12U
Inside the Pillow Lab: Ananya Dance Theatre (2022) https://youtu.be/KgH-aIm7Q5E?si=Blzt2goEa_pU7TOY
Norton Owen: Welcome to PillowVoices, a production of Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival, featuring content from the Pillow Archives. I'm Norton Owen the Pillow’s Director of Preservation and it's my pleasure to introduce our host, Dr. Arushi Singh—a New Delhi-born, Los Angeles-based scholar, dancer, educator, and journal editor of Conversations Across the Field of Dance Studies. In this episode, we dive deep into the historical and cultural contexts of three contemporary Indian choreographers who critically engage with South Asian and Western aesthetic lineages to define their artistic identities.
Arushi Singh: In this episode of Pillow Voices, we will focus on three artists from the Indian dance diaspora: Hari Krishnan, Ananya Chatterjea, and Aakash Odedra. Each of these artists brings a layered and distinct movement vocabulary to their work, revealing the complexities that emerge from blending, tension, and the confrontation of diverse dance lineages. Their choreographic worlds invite us into a space where tradition meets transformation—a dynamic realm where South Asian movement practices are reimagined, reshaped, and infused with the energy of the contemporary world. In this space, choreography transcends mere movement; it becomes a living conversation between the past and the present, between heritage and innovation.
Krishnan, Chatterjea, and Odedra use their movement languages to explore the fluidity of belonging—not tied to one place, but to many—while navigating the intersections of culture, migration, and memory. The three artists represent different corners of the diaspora, each bringing a unique perspective shaped by their personal and cultural histories. Krishnan, with significant ties to Canada by way of Singapore, draws upon the rich interplay of Tamil and queer identities in his work. Chatterjea, originally from Kolkata and now based in the U.S., infuses her choreography with feminist, anti-racist and anti-casteist frameworks. Odedra, from the U.K. with roots in Gujarat, merges classical and contemporary forms to interrogate questions of identity and displacement. While their geographic and cultural contexts vary, their collective work forges new pathways of expression, addressing themes of belonging, cultural hybridity, and resistance.
At the core of their choreographic practices is a critical engagement with postcolonial histories. Each artist confronts, questions, and redefines these histories through their work, challenging dominant narratives and reclaiming stories that have been underrepresented or erased. In doing so, they not only expand the boundaries of Indian dance but also reshape how it is perceived and practiced within the diaspora.
Krishnan, Chatterjea, and Odedra also push back against the Eurocentric framing of contemporary dance. Rather than engaging in aesthetic experimentation for its own sake, their work critiques the structures of power embedded in Western dance discourses. For these artists, dance becomes a powerful form of embodied agency—an act of resilience and solidarity with marginalized communities. Their bodies become sites of negotiation where histories of trauma, survival, and change are enacted.
Equally important, their creative practices emphasize community and collaboration. By inviting dancers, musicians, and other artists to draw from their own cultural frameworks and socio-political realities, these choreographers create productions that are deeply rooted in collective experience and shared storytelling.
Throughout this episode, I’ll unpack the aesthetic choices and creative processes of these three artists. I’ll explore how their time at the Pillow Lab—Jacob’s Pillow’s artist residency program—provided a fertile space for bodies, movements, and ideas to engage in continuous dialogue, enriching their artistic explorations.
We’ll journey through one significant work from each artist, uncovering how Krishnan, Chatterjea, and Odedra are not only transforming the landscape of Indian dance but also redefining the possibilities of contemporary dance within the diaspora and beyond.
Hari Krishnan: For dance and for art to live, it must address contemporary concerns in a very urgent way. And this urgency can only be manifested if we break down silos and boxes.
Arushi Singh: In this excerpt from Hari Krishnan’s Pillow Lab in March of 2024, he emphasizes the importance of challenging rigid categories in the performance world to unlock dance’s potential as a tool for critiquing and reshaping society. Krishnan asserts that to authentically reflect the complexities of their time, dance makers must break aesthetic boundaries and embrace unexpected juxtapositions in their creative practice. This approach is central to Krishnan’s work entitled Rowdies in Love, which he was developing during the residency.
Hari Krishnan: And there should be a distinct difference between eroticism and sensuality. So it’s a very intimate moment rather than a sexual moment. Yeah. It’s very pleasurable and sensual and just feeling each other and really entering this new space of love.
Arushi Singh: We hear Krishnan guiding his dancers during rehearsal for Rowdies in Love, a piece that blends humor with social commentary to explore the rebellious spirit of love and desire. Central to his guidance is the distinction he urges his dancers to make between sensual and sexual desire as they navigate close-contact partner work, which involves touching each other’s face while gazing deeply into one another’s eyes and in another moment, exchanging tender embraces in various formations.
I understand his direction as echoing how eroticism is often conveyed in Indian dance, where it transcends the physical, carnal realm. Subtle body movements, suggestive glances, and evocative postures transform the sensual into longing, beauty, and often spiritual—connection. Across many Indian performance traditions, the erotic also extends beyond personal or sexual desire to celebrate collective abundance and the continuity of life.
Krishnan’s choreography highlights the evocative and social aspects of the erotic, playing with the expressive gestures of Bharatanatyam and heightened theatricality to depict and discard cliches of hypermasculinity. Performed by eight male dancers who embody a flirtatious yet defiant energy, the work centers on queer intimacy—an especially resonant theme given the ongoing struggles with homophobia, transphobia, and colonial-era anti-gay laws that persist across Asia and the globe.
Against this backdrop, I view Krishnan’s work as interrogating the erotic to negotiate identity and challenge oppressive legacies. Colonial-era laws imposed rigid gender binaries, criminalized queer identities, and policed women’s bodies across the Global South, erasing indigenous understandings of gender and sexuality. In Rowdies in Love, Krishnan seems to directly confront these histories, resisting Western narratives that reduce the erotic to moral transgression. Instead, he creates a space where the erotic serves as a site of resistance, reclaiming queer and racialized bodies from the exoticization, commodification, and regulation imposed by colonial frameworks.
Similar to Krishnan, Ananya Chatterjea performs stories in support of historically marginalized communities, a concept she describes in the following soundbite.
Ananya Chatterjea: I describe my work as social justice choreography, which means I don’t tell other people’s stories, but I shine light in the best way possible on stories that call out for justice. And it's a mosaic of inspirations that are understood through an embodied practice.
Arushi Singh: Chatterjea’s social justice choreography is brought to life through a unique technique, created by the choreographer herself, called Yorchha™, which is realized in performance by her company, Ananya Dance Theatre.
Inspired by the spirit of Dakini—a female figure in Tibetan Buddhism often seen as an embodiment of wisdom, energy, spiritual transformation, sometimes depicted as a goddess of liberation—Yorchha™ reflects Chatterjea’s artistic vision. The technique seeks to harness “an inconvenient practice rooted in femme rage and ecstasy as forces for equity and healing.” According to the artist, this approach creates dance designed to confront both the audience and performer, provoking discomfort while inspiring change.
Now let’s delve into a specific moment from Chatterjea’s Pillow Lab, where her company members apply this technique during the rehearsal process.
[music layered underneath]
Arushi Singh: The room vibrates with the electrifying cadence of synchronized, collective breaths, resonating like waves surging between the dancers. Amid this oceanic soundscape, the fierce, thunderous stomping of their feet forges a steady, commanding beat, each impact punctuated by the sharp squeak of heels rooted firmly yet pivoting with purpose. Syncopated rhythms burst forth as the dancers sweep across the space in deep, grounded stances, their robust frames exuding strength and stability while weaving through the recitation of bols—rhythmic syllables that propel their arms in fluid, yet forceful arcs. Like an elephant’s trunk, their limbs ripple with power, extending and retracting before their torsos, layering the space with palpable tension and textured energy.
This movement vocabulary illustrates the Yorchha™ technique, which fuses principles of vinyasa yoga, Odissi, and Chhau. Upon further research, I discovered which aspects Chatterjea has selected from these individual physical traditions to build this technique. Rooted in Odissi, the technique highlights floor connection, intricate footwork, spirals, and curvilinear body shapes. Building on this foundation, vinyasa yoga contributes breathwork and a focus on internal energy, while Chhau introduces elements of martial arts, such as hip shifts and spiraling jumps, drawing from the groundbreaking contributions of female practitioners to a traditionally male-dominated form. By intersecting these distinct influences, Chatterjea asserts that Yorchha™ celebrates feminine strength and fluidity, empowering the company to tell compelling stories from global communities of color.
Nūn Gherāo: Surrounded by Salt, the piece whose first iteration was being developed by Ananya Dance Theatre during Pillow Lab, expands on this key concern. Drawing from the 1978-79 Morichjhapi Island massacre of Dalit refugees in West Bengal, India, the piece explores themes of betrayal, dispossession, exile, and the fierce resilience that sustains hope. As indicated by the description on the company’s website, the work unfolds through shared breath, rhythmic rituals, mourning practices, and dances that intertwine personal and collective memory. Meditations on dancing in salt water evoke connections between individual tears (or grief) and the warming, rising oceans. In the following clip, Ananya Dance Theatre company member Kealoha Ferreira discusses the multivalent potential of salt, which informs the thematic structure and movement qualities of the piece.
Kealoha Ferreira: Specifically salt because it is an element of earth and water. It is an element of necessity. And it’s an element with a lot of potency. Has the ability to transform, right? Has the ability to preserve, has the ability to diminish or to extinguish. Or even in some situations, has the ability to exterminate.
[musical interlude]
Arushi Singh: Rooted in the traditions of Sufi music, dance, and poetry, Aakash Odedra’s Songs of Bulbul creates a compelling dialogue between Kathak’s dynamic physicality and Sufism’s focus on the impermanence of worldly existence. As highlighted in the musical interlude, the production seamlessly merges orchestral and Indian classical music, guiding audiences on a transformative journey that traces cultural pathways from Persia to the Indian subcontinent, while anchoring the experience in themes and sounds with universal resonance.
Aakash Odedra: Bulbul is a Persian nightingale. It’s a mythical story about a mythical bird. And there was a, a reward for capturing this bird because the songs are so exquisite. So once this bird was captured, there was a whole refining process, hard process for the bird, because the bird was caged then removed away from any sight. And the final stage is where the bird’s eyes are removed. So it can’t see. The idea is that each stage builds a sense of desperation or longing, and then in the end, ultimately the bulbul leaves its body. And that’s the only way it frees itself. It’s a quite a heavy story, but the story for me has a very important parallel to the life of an artist because everytime I perform, I feel I die and leave a part of myself on stage, until in the end there’s nothing left.
Arushi Singh: In the clip you just heard from Aakash Odedra’s Pillow Lab in December 2023, the choreographer shares how his new work draws inspiration from an ancient Sufi tale about a captive bulbul. This story, shared with him by his collaborator, Rani Khanam, tells of a bird bound and overcome by despair. Despite this confinement, the bulbul sings increasingly beautiful melodies, culminating in a final, hauntingly beautiful song before its death. This myth appears to encapsulate the idea that beauty can emerge from loss, and that freedom may come through sacrifice. It reflects the ephemeral nature of both dance and an artist’s life. Like the bird’s song, dance exists only in the fleeting moment before it disappears.
Building on this narrative, Odedra’s in process showing demonstrates an interplay of Kathak and contemporary release technique. This movement vocabulary vividly conveys the emotional depth of the Sufi tale. The choreography juxtaposes sharp, precise footwork with expansive, flowing arm gestures, evoking the tension between restriction and the yearning for freedom. Odedra’s use of circular pathways and spiraling motions mirrors the bird’s journey, symbolizing both entrapment and the soul’s ascent toward liberation. The interaction between stillness and motion becomes a powerful tool in the piece. Subtle, poignant moments of stillness emphasize despair, while dynamic spins and rhythmic crescendos convey resilience and transcendence. These transitions echo the fleeting beauty of birdsong, capturing the essence of impermanence with lyrical grace. Incorporating contemporary release technique, Odedra employs grounded, organic movements that contrast with the formality of Kathak’s structured rhythms. This fusion allows him to explore a deeper connection to his body and emotions, using breath and release to facilitate a more fluid expression of the inner journey toward freedom. Ultimately, Odedra’s movement language considers a universal subject while rooting in Sufism’s central quest. He does this by inviting audiences to feel the fragility of life while at the same time embodying the soul’s persistent pursuit of spiritual fulfillment.
[musical interlude]
Arushi Singh: Interdependence and collaboration are central to the work of all three choreographers, serving as the very foundation of their artistic visions. These are not mere afterthoughts, but essential to bringing their imagined worlds into being. Collaboration is more than just a creative process—it is a politic, deeply embedded, in my opinion, in a distinctly South Asian approach to art-making that thrives on collective effort. In many South Asian traditions, dance is intertwined with rituals, storytelling, and spiritual practices, often involving entire communities. Performances are shaped by a shared interest, whether through ensemble work, interconnected narratives, or the intertextual relationship between dancers, musicians, and audiences. Here, collectivism is not just an aesthetic choice; it’s a social catalyst, creating space for connection and dialogue that transcends the individual.
To illustrate how this ethic is put into practice by these artists, I’d like you to first hear from Eury German, one of the dancers in Hari Krishnan’s Rowdies in Love, as German explains the value of being cast in a piece exploring queer male intimacy.
Eury German: Alot of us do identify as queer and non-binary people. And I think that inherently lends itself to like a really beautiful space where it feels like an immediate and not like a belabored love that is shared amongst us. Being at the Pillow, I’ve felt this really intense camaraderie and like community building I didn’t expect, but was like very much welcomed.
Arushi Singh: Next, let’s examine how collaboration unfolds in Ananya Chatterjea’s choreography. The word gherāo in the title of Chatterjea’s production refers to a community protest tactic in which people encircle authority figures to demand accountability. This method of protest gained prominence during the labor movements in India in the 1950s and 1960s, when workers would surround factory managers or government officials to assert their demands for better working conditions, wages, or rights. The gherao tactic has since been employed in various other forms of civil protest. Drawing from this, Chatterjea insists in her Inside the Pillow Lab interview that the piece serves as a unified form of resistance against the brutal intersection of political violence and ecological crisis, only made possible through a multicultural ensemble of women and femme performers. In this soundbite from the Q&A following Ananya Dance Theatre’s 2022 Pillow Lab in-process showing, several company members describe the politics underpinning Nūn Gherāo: Surrounded by Salt and how their personal connections to its themes influenced their participation.
Performer 1: Ok. I can start (audience laughs). And I think I’d like to answer it via the form that we do. So the technique that we train and that we embody in performance is called Yorchha™ , created by Dr. Ananya Chatterjea. It is a transnational feminist contemporary dance form. And I really love to claim the transnational feminism embedded inside the technique because it really does become the container for us to enter. And in training in Yorchha™ for me is also a practice of embodying solidarity. And embodying difference, and understanding how differences interact in the space, and then in performance, added layers of that. So I’ll start, I’ll start with that much. But there’s so much more.
Performer 2: I will say that part of the process was Ananya asking each of us our relationship to salt and saltwater. And so I define culture as a way of life, and so we just bring that with us when we answer those questions. And so we each went by, in several rehearsals, and when we got here, our relationships of saltwater—our own memories, our own histories, our own ancestries. And from there taking, for me, taking my own relationship and then when I get to hear someone else’s inside of the choreography that’s already placed. And then that becomes the world emotionally that I enter through myself, inside of Ananya’s choreography.
Performer 3: Yeah and to speak a little bit more about the process that Alexis brought up, this work of emotionally mapping the work. And so beyond questions of, you know, just what is your relationship to saltwater but also, you know, in this movement that Ananya choreographed, like what is it, what is showing up for you, whether it’s in your body, whether it's in your history. And then a huge part of sharing those different histories that we carry with us, is finding relationality with each other, and where, at what point in history did our ancestors maybe meet, or how did, how do our histories intersect? And so one of, you know, that early beginning, wading, in the beginning in the first piece, you know, is a lot about carcerality. And like there are so many experiences of humanitarian carcerality that Black and Brown people go through, whether, you know, it’s actual incarceration in the criminal system, refugee camps, migration detention centers, all of those. And so, we’re all so related through our stories. And how to then, how to find the shape of that emotion or that feeling is kind of approached differently. I think that’s part of what entices the work for me.
Arushi Singh: Collaboration in Akash Odedra’s piece highlights the symbiotic relationship between music and movement, which is central to the aesthetic and pedagogical principles of Kathak. In the following clip, you will first hear Odedra, followed by his music collaborator, Rushil Ranjan, discussing this crucial aspect.
Aakash Odedra: So he, he can talk about the music part, but till, you know, we just did this live part now in front of you. That was really, um, and the music was still being adjusted till (Ranjan: this morning), the last minute, you know. We were here last night till 1:30 AM in the studio here. So he can tell you a bit more. And I will just say that all these, um, musicians, even Rani as a choreographer, she’s actually a musician inside. Like every rhythm and beat, she’s actually made on the spot spontaneously. And it’s all mathematical, but it’s kind of an in-built thing. And then he has a hard task of bringing in the orchestra and his world. So, um…you can share.
Rushil Ranjan: Yeah. Um, it's a wonderful task to try and work out which comes first, whether the dance comes first or the music comes first. And sometimes it's the former and sometimes it's the latter. And in the first piece, for example, that was completely improvised, in the sense of the poetry exists, but it was completely free. And if we were to do it again, it would be entirely different. And Aakash is responding to that on the fly, which I find just absolutely incredible. And then in reverse, the second piece that we did, was, was preset. So they performed many of the raw ingredients that you heard live and then I took that away and tried to create a form of it, which included Western orchestration and things like that to try and bring a universal sound to it as well. And then I think, so they inform each other, but that was the process for those particular ones.
Arushi Singh: In Kathak, musicality is a foundational element, interwoven into the rhythmic, melodic, and performative aspects of the dance. The form is structured around complex rhythmic cycles (called taals), where the dancer’s footwork aligns precisely with the beats of the music, creating a nuanced dialogue between movement and sound. This synergy between music and dance is also the basis for Kathak improvisation, allowing the dancer to respond creatively to the evolving musical composition. Through variations in rhythm, tempo, and gestural language, the dancer engages in an improvised exchange with the musicians, while staying grounded in traditional frameworks. Odedra’s improvisation during his in-process showing of Songs of Bulbul highlights the mutual responsiveness between performer and musician, providing space for creative expression within the bounds of established rhythmic and melodic patterns.
[musical interlude]
Arushi Singh: In the final part of this episode, I’ll discuss how each artist’s contemporary work challenges or reclaims elements of Indian dance history shaped by Western cultural imperialism.
One of the primary choreographic collaborators with Aaksha Odedra on Songs of Bulbul is Rani Khanam, a leading figure in the revival of Sufiana Kathak, a once-thriving art form. Sufiana Kathak, a sophisticated blend of Sufi spirituality and the expressive storytelling of Kathak, flourished within North India’s tawaif, or courtesan culture, particularly in the 18th and early 19th century of the Mughal era. Tawaifs, renowned for their mastery of music, dance, and poetry, were independent, financially autonomous Muslim and Hindu women who, during this period, often served as cultural and intellectual elites. However, British colonialism disrupted this tradition.
Viewing courtesan culture through a Victorian moral lens, colonial authorities—along with upper-caste and class Hindu reformers—condemned tawaifs, equating their performances with prostitution and enacting restrictive policies like the Anti-Nautch Act (or Anti-dance Act), which marginalized these performers and criminalized their profession. Simultaneously, nationalist movements sought to align Kathak with emerging ideals of cultural purity. This effort to promote a so-called "respectable" cultural identity distanced Kathak from its courtesan origins, nearly erasing Sufiana Kathak from public memory.
While traces of this style persist today, efforts to revive its rich heritage remain challenging. Khanam’s engagement with Islamic and Sufi texts has enabled her to craft a specialized repertoire that integrates Sufiana poetry and Islamic verses, earning widespread critical acclaim. By selecting Khanam as a collaborator on Songs of Bulbul, Odedra not only foregrounds her expertise but also revitalizes this nearly forgotten form.
On her company website, Ananya Chatterjea states that through the creation of the Yorchha™ technique, she aims to challenge stereotypes and reimagine the perception of Indian dance in the West. She further goes on to explain that Yorchha™ integrates the breath awareness of yoga with the drshti (or gaze) and mudras (or hand gestures) of classical Indian dance to direct energy. In Yorchha™, mudras primarily serve to complete movement lines and enhance the dynamics of motion. This approach defies the Western tendency to view Indian dance as either overly ornamental or exclusively narrative-driven. By shifting the focus to abstract dynamics and recontextualizing traditional elements, Yorchha™ invites Western audiences to see Indian dance as a versatile, contemporary art form—one that actively engages with broader ideas of power.
Similarly, Hari Krishnan’s choreography addresses the historical misrepresentation of Indian culture in Western dance. The following audio clip features Krishnan, followed by Eury German, sharing how his work with gender, sexuality, and identity seeks to disrupt and reframe the colonial gaze that has shaped North American dance theatre.
Hari Krishnan: One of the first dancers I saw when I was growing up as a young child in Singapore was a video of Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn. Dancing, what they would call their ethnic dances, where they were cultural voyeurs. I wasn’t sure what I was looking at, but that seeped into my social consciousness. And that coupled with being born and raised in multicultural Singapore really gave me a broad outlook in terms of what else dance could encompass.
[percussion sounds]
Eury German: He is continuing the legacy of Ted Shawn in a much more queer frontal, queer liberated, queer joy kind of way. And I think obviously Ted Shawn was trying to do that and couldn’t because of the times. And I think that Hari is trying to continue his legacy on in exactly the vision he wanted, right? Like I think queer people in general create and do futuristic art. And I think that this is Ted Shawn’s wildest dream. That’s like what’s so beautiful about this particular work ‘cause it does connect very linearly to his legacy, his work, to Hari’s work, to Hari’s legacy, the themes he’s exploring and what he is trying to say.
Arushi Singh: Krishnan contends with and expands on the legacy of Ted Shawn. Ted Shawn, like many of his contemporaries in the early American modern dance movement, engaged with orientalist practices, often interpreting non-Western dances through a Western lens that prioritized spectacle over cultural fidelity. While Shawn admired and sought inspiration from a range of global dance traditions, his approach frequently simplified or altered these dances to fit American tastes and pre-existing, often romanticized, notions of the "exotic." In doing so, he selectively used and reconfigured costumes, gestures, and narrative elements from Asian, Middle Eastern, Afro-diasporic, and Indigenous American cultures, creating portrayals that while visually striking, were aesthetically inaccurate and reductive. These representations contributed to the commodification and mystification of non-Western cultures in the American imagination, framing them as objects of fascination rather than complex, living traditions.
From my perspective, Shawn’s work also played into broader gendered dynamics of orientalism, where the exaggeration of hypermasculine bodies in his all-male company intended to stand in contrast to the “effeminate” or “soft” qualities attributed to non-Western men. These representations, while celebrating virility to counteract the homophobia of the time and address Shawn’s own fears about sexuality, also mirrored Western anxieties about controlling the “Other,” reworking the assumed “passivity” and “weakness” of non-Western bodies and masculinity into familiar forms that still conformed to Western ideals of dominance. This engagement with ethnocentric representations not only shaped the early trajectory of American modern dance but also contributed to a legacy of cultural distortion that Indian and other non-Western dancers, such as Hari Krishnan, continue to critique and challenge.
In satirizing performances of hypermasculinity and foregrounding queer relationality in Rowdies in Love, Krishnan interrogates archaic cultural and gendered stereotypes. He offers a complex, self-determined view of gender and identity, resisting the colonial forces that continue to shape the representation of non-Western and gender nonconforming bodies in dance and performance.
The work of Hari Krishnan, Ananya Chatterjea, and Aakash Odedra highlights how contemporary dance serves as a space for investigating difference and otherness. Through their practices, they critique dominant narratives in Western dance discourse and advocate for a more all-encompassing understanding that acknowledges the contributions and innovations of the Global South. Ultimately, their work calls for a broader appreciation of what constitutes contemporary dance, as demonstrated in the following clip featuring Spenser Stroud, one of the performers from Krishnan’s work.
Spenser Stroud: When we talk about contemporary dance, I think people have this preconceived notion that it’s purely within abstraction. But it can come from and be imbued from other forms, and specifically non-Western forms that can resituate Western perspectives, specifically American perspectives. And I think that is one part of the work that is truly radical, and novel and needed.
Arushi Singh:The aesthetic practice of abstraction in Western contemporary dance obscures the colonial histories and cultural specificities of non-Western influences, reinforcing Eurocentric hierarchies of value and authenticity in the arts. It often involves distilling movement away from its cultural roots, aiming for a "universal" quality that is supposedly free of specific historical or geographical ties. Many non-Western forms were key sources for early Western dance innovators, a legacy that persists amongst current practitioners in this field. Yet the techniques derived from these forms have rarely been acknowledged or compensated. Instead, these movements have been "neutralized" within a framework that denies their original context, purpose, and meaning, allowing Western artists to claim originality and innovation without engaging with the people and traditions from whom they borrowed.
This practice continues to reinforce a colonial classification by positioning Western artists as arbiters of what constitutes “art,” while relegating non-Western forms to categories such as “ethnic” or “folk,” placing them outside the realms of high art and contemporary discourse. As a result, Western (or North American) dance remains dominant in global art markets, institutions, and academic canons, while non-Western artists are pressured to either adopt Western aesthetics to be seen as “modern” or remain marginalized.
The three artists I have addressed in this episode call for an acknowledgment of these histories, advocating for a more just, inclusive, and ethically engaged dance world that recognizes non-Western forms as integral to the evolution and richness of contemporary dance practices.
As a scholar and artist navigating Indian and North American dance worlds, I find meaningful connections in the work of these artists as they challenge dominant frameworks. Their choreographic practices resist the erasure of cultural specificity and disrupt long-standing hierarchies that have marginalized non-Western forms, creating space for cultural reclamation and representation.
Their work, although, goes beyond merely preserving traditions. It involves critically engaging with the long and complex histories of misappropriated labor and creativity within Indian dance—histories that are deeply tied to broader systems of inequality shaped by caste, religion, sexual orientation, and gender identity, which continue to influence South Asian arts today.
Hari Krishnan, Ananya Chatterjea, and Aakash Odedra bring attention to these entrenched inequities while amplifying voices that have long been excluded. Through their choreographies, they emphasize the importance of critically engaging with our cultural inheritances as a vital aspect of reclaiming identity.
For me, this engagement represents a form of creative action—a way to rethink and reshape the dance and cultural landscape. It is an approach rooted in thoughtful reflection, innovation, and the ongoing process of defining cultural narratives on our own terms.
Norton Owen: That’s it for this episode of PillowVoices. Thank you for joining us today. On behalf of Jacob’s Pillow we look forward to sharing more dance with you through the films, essays, and podcasts at DanceInteractive.jacobspillow.org and of course through live experiences during our Festival and throughout the year. Special thanks to the National Endowment for the Arts for helping launch this podcast series. Please subscribe to PillowVoices wherever you get your podcasts and visit us soon, either online or onsite.