Dance and temples have an undefined bond; the aesthetic commonalities between temple architecture and the architectures of Indian dance are many. How dance originated, with the incorporation of the immortal sculptures that have designed the pattern of dances, is well known. In dance, of late, the architecture of the temple and ritualistic explorations of its spaces add a third dimension to the dance, for this is something that is worked upon extensively. With many dance productions exploring the aspect of dance and architecture, it seems like we are going back to our roots to find an entirely new meaning to dance.
Temple architecture deserves a holistic view — it is the source of movement in dance. Moving beyond the convention of the temple standing as a symbol of faith, it speaks much more of culturally rich traditions that define myriad movements and signify the various postures, movements and repertoires.
The temple is primarily a structure that stood as a living example of the social, political and economic situations that prevail in society. S. Jayachandran, a Bharatanatyam dancer and assistant professor at Kalakshetra Foundation, Chennai, says there are multiple ways of correlating temple architecture and dance. “Any architectural structure is meant to serve a purpose. Temples have served multiple utilities from being a university (a case in point is Kanchi University) to apartment structures and melting points of exchanging ideas,” says Jayachandran. In this scenario, he places dance with a societal background and explains the role of the dancer as sociological. “Every temple has a ritual specialist. The male ritual specialist is the priest who performs the daily puja while the female ritual specialist would be the dancer. She shows her devotion through dance and music and her body becomes an instrument of communication. She treats God with utter devotion and becomes his female consort. Devadasis would ward off the evil eye from the precincts of the temple and that was one of the core rituals. They would simply dance for God, facing the deity inside the temple,” he elaborates.
Dance is endowed with very different meanings when its history, context, and the times in which it evolved are understood. The movements get a new significance and more than accepting it as pure, rigid tradition, one can decode the pattern easily. “I simply felt more confident as I went about exploring the relation between dance and temple architecture. The historical aspects help you understand the choreography of traditional items in a much easier way. I wanted to investigate further and discover why some movements are designed in a particular fashion and the cobwebbed perceptions about such aspects were brushed away when I went back to the temples,” says Jayachandran
The placement of dance matters the most and plays a significant role in the way movements are structured. The mandap or the stage where a dancer performs makes much of a difference. Earlier the king would sit at a height above the ground and watch the dancer perform from there. And the dancer would be in centre watched upon by the audience on three sides. But the dynamics are different today. The stage that a dancer performs on is at a greater height above the audience and most of the times the dancer only has to face the audience from one side. Earlier one would have a dancing arena where the dancer would face audience from three sides or all the four. The dancing courtyard in a king’s palace would be surrounded by audience from three sides. “Temple space goes much beyond the metaphysical aspect. I feel it is the best form of a codified, planned management organisation,” says Jayachandran.
Surupa Sen, an Odissi exponent who conceptualised and choreographed “Sacred Space”, a dance production that explored the journey from outside of the temple to inside. Along with an architect Surupa studied the spaces of the temple, inside and the outside. “A temple for me stands as a foundation for human body. It stands as a journey of an individual. The outer space of a temple is ornamental with elaborate décor and sculpted beauty and as one proceeds to the most divine, one realises the purity and sheer contrast of the inside and outside. It’s shedding about all inhibitions, all ego and gaining pure consciousness,” says Surupa.
She draws an analogy with the traditional repertoire in Odissi by starting off with an invocation and moving onto a lyrical piece and tracing the journey of architecture. The last piece is Moksha invoking the Gods and surrendering oneself to the Lord. “Hinduism is an inclusive religion and it incorporated Jainism, Buddhism and all of these religions. And Indian architecture is a repository of all these traditions and faiths,” says Surupa. “For me personally the temple represents a person’s journey as a symbol of faith and expression. It is the physical expression of the inner aspiration to merge with the infinite,” she adds further.
A research by British architect Adam Hardy looks into the correspondence between a temple and dance, which is a form of artistic expression. He studies how temple goes beyond an expression of movement and seems to be progressing on the patterns of growth in multiple directions. One of the common grounds is bringing about a thought process and understanding the significance of traditional choreography which can channelise into innovative forms of creativity.
Madhu Natraj, well-known Kathak and contemporary dancer choreographed a piece for the Purana Qila festival by studying the iconographical aspect of the Persian and Hindu culture. She says, “I look at the philosophy of the space by studying its architectural meaning which is then conceptualised and interpreted through dance. Dance for me would be an architectural extension in this context. The geometry and the foundation of a temple space is an extremely important aspect,” says Natraj.