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When digits acquire form
Electric and eclectic — Jemima and Navtej.
ASK NAVTEJ and Jemima why they called their performance ReMembering. The pair who would rather dance than talk. Not that they don't talk, they just dance so well together.
When you saw Navtej Johar and Jemima Hoadley perform on Wednesday at ReMembering, a show organised by the British Council, did you imagine at any point of time that the two actually planned most of it on e-mail? No webcam, only e-mail.
Weird? Perhaps, but true. And what better prelude to a performance that examines the body in the arena of cyberspace.
Navtej, a bharatanatyam dancer and Jemima, more of a contemporary dancer, met in London in the summer of 1999, where Navtej was interning as part of his Charles Wallace Art Award and Jemima was experimenting with physical theatre in the Laban Centre. Having decided that they had a great rapport the two decided that they simply must collaborate on a project about the meeting of the two cultures, and whatever happens, `no fusion dance'.
They continued communicating with each other much after Navtej came back to India. It was when British Council put forth an irresistible well-funded proposal before them that the two realised their dream to work together professionally. What they had on their hands was a commission from the Council for a performance that would be part of the UK-India Science Festival, but little else.
Navtej could not go to England and Jemima had her own schedule too. In retrospect, what a great thing to happen! ``We worked on the same thing, she in her studio and me here in India, in mine. We were co-ordinating on e-mail,'' says Navtej. Of course it was difficult in the beginning, but once they got over the time-difference hassle, they began understanding each other across the world wide web.
So, technology was a strong reference point in the performance. ``E-mail, chat, time differences, slight virtual delays, speed, insecure net lines _ we packed all these aspects into the performance,'' Jemima explains. Reality is constantly juxtaposed with fantasy and sometimes loses its power in the world of virtual reality. In their own words, `Fantasy becomes more real than real, and reality is arrested by curiosity'.
Another important observation the team makes during the performance is the way technology replaces human contact. The WWW makes things work faster, but it also displaces essential human interaction. Fractured, imagined identities are all possible within this web. Erasure of reference points disorients memory and identity. While examining the truth behind web identities, the pair also uses subtle delicate gestures that connect users to the past, finding islands of belonging there.
Both of them are emphatic that they are not passing any judgment on technology. ``There may be slight comment, but we are not saying technology is good or bad. We are saying, its here, to stay. So let's look at what it does to the human body'', they chime.
Through movements created specially, closest in form to contemporary dance, Navtej and Jemima showed how the body is constantly dis-membered and re-membered in the techno-world. With interesting video and audio interludes, form suited content and impressed the audience. But of course, if you had missed that hour-long performance on Wednesday, you would not understand, because there is no way those exquisite emotions and movements can be re-membered in any other form.
By Ramya Kannan
Photo: Vino John
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Life
Bangalore
Chennai
Coimbatore
Hyderabad
Kochi
Madurai
Thiruvananthapuram
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