Kerela’s Natnam dance-drama enthrals Bhopali audience

We’ve heard that dancers inspire artwork and paintings, but with Kerela’s new dance form ‘Natnam’ it was the other way round. Inspired by Raja Ravi Verma’s paintings, artiste Jayakrishnan and his group from Kerela created a new dance-drama format. This form has infused a lot of modern dance moves in its classical choreography, and the make-up of the artistes too has been kept subtle to emulate the paintings. Music however was produced with conventional instruments like maddalam, chenda, idakka along with accompaniment of table, harmonium and sarangi.For the presentation at Tribal Museum in Bhopal, the group brought out short stories from the epic Mahabharata, like swayanwar of Draupadi, the story of Hidimba Rakshasi and Bheem, the day when lac palace is burnt down etc. Undoubtedly, audience was transfixed by the subliminal portrayal, and the fusion elements in this new form of dancing.