NEXT! + Crossroads virtual event hosted by Pioneers Go East Collective presenting:
Parijat Desai - Gestures into Movement: Choreography Workshop
Saturday, November 14, 3:00–5:00p
Zoom | FREE | RSVP: pioneersgoeast@gmail.com
Join us for this free workshop led by choreographer Parijat Desai! we will play with ways to move from words into gesture and movement and to juxtapose text and movement.
We begin with screening a video of a performance by Parijat Desai, including from Pardon My Heart (2019). In Pardon My Heart, Parijat reimagines Indian classical dance's lovelorn heroine (the nayika)—at times melodramatic and self-centered, at other times concerned with sorrows of the nation. Parijat's nayika voices different aspects of her "self" through reciting poetry by Black poet/scholar Marcus Jackson (author of book Pardon My Heart), and by legendary Pakistani reformer and poet Faiz Ahmad Faiz, to voice aspects of the character.
Following a brief screening and discussion, we move into the participatory workshop.
India-born, U.S.-raised Parijat Desai is the artistic director of Parijata Dance Company. As a choreographer, Parijat collaborates with various artists to create multidisciplinary performance weaving together movement, text, and visual design. Her dance is a hybrid of contemporary, Indian classical and Gujarati folk dance; theater; and other movement forms. Her performances speak in blended languages both to express her South Asian American identity and experience, and to challenge ideas of cultural purity and fear that underlie nationalism and xenophobia in the United States and India. Parijat also leads Dance In The Round, a program sharing circle dances from Gujarat, India, as a vehicle for supporting community well-being and engagement. She is a 2020 artist-in-residence with Center for Performance Research, and a member of the 2020–21 BRICLab Performance Residency cohort.
www.parijatdesai.org | FB: ParijataDanceCompany
RSVP at pioneersgoeast@gmail.com and we’ll send you the Meeting ID to join us on Zoom live. All participants are welcome! Follow us on Instagram for upcoming workshops (Spring 2021).