Pilgrimage to Beauty

One afternoon in August of the year 1935, Srimati Rukmini Devi wanted a few friends both at Adyar and outside to meet her for a heart to heart talk on a matter of utmost importance to her – an Art Centre. Sri Yagneswaran, her brother, myself, Sri K. Ramakotiswara Rau and the late Sri K. Narayana Menon were the four to gather together to meet her in the thatched but in Besant Gardens. Srimati Rukmini was not apparently concerned then with any great ambition for the regeneration of our arts. She simply made us think of the necessity for an Art Centre where some of the arts, especially music and dance, could thrive with very correct standards and under beneficial guidance. None of us dreamed of the potentiality she had for a dedicated life to the arts.

It would be relevant here to record the status of Indian art in general and of the dance in particular, inthe cultural life of India in the nineteen twenties and the early nineteen thirties. Music was vigorously alive, though already influences had begun to undermine its purity. Painting was still in the hands of the early Bengali pioneers and those who had learnt from them English was the literary medium for the majority but an interest in and pride for the beauty of the Indian tongues were awakening under the warm influence of Tagore and others. Indian dance was, however, at its nadir. While there were still dancers whose standards in technique were impeccable, the art itself had acquired bad repute. It had become associated with bad ways of life and had begun to hide from public gaze in the byways of society. In the prior decade, highly respected citizens of Madras such as Sir P. S. Sivaswamy Aiyar, Rt. Hon. V. S. Srinivasa Sastry, Sir C. P. Ramaswamy Aiyer, Sri T. R. Venkatarama Sastry and others had launched a movement against what came, in a later era, to be called ‘Bharatanatya’. They themselves signed and circulated for signature a declaration in which they affirmed that they would never witness a dance performance themselves and would also discourage other people from doing it. It is an interesting sequel that later, Sir P. S. Sivaswami Aiyar, Rt. Hon. Srinivasa Sastry, Sri T. R. Venkatarama Sastry and Sir C. P. Ramaswami Aiyer all presided over Arangetral performances of students who had gradua­ted in dancing from Kalakshetra. This was a sign of their generous open-mindedness and their recognition of the fact that with the work of Rukmini Devi and Kalakshetra, the dance in South India had entered a new phase of existence.

It was at this period that Rukmini Devi had started to learn the dance which at that time was called ‘Sadir’ or ‘Chinna Melam.’ Though born and brought up in South India, on account of the stigma attached to the dance, she had not seen any dancing done by the Devadasis. She had, however, a good knowledge of the western ballet in which she had her first lessons from no less a person than Anna Pavlova herself. In 1932, she was taken to see a dance recital by two well-known South Indian dancers of the time and was immediately struck by the beauty of the art and its possibilities. The interest enkindled in her was so great that she began to go to the recitals of all the better known dancers of the time. At the same time, she began to search for a good teacher to teach her in the way in which she wanted to learn. This was not easy. The Nattuvanarsor teachers of the time only knew the bare technique. They did not know the significance of the Sastra and their repertoire was sometimes poor and banal. The majority of the songs to which the dances were composed were sentimental or sensual. The musical knowledge possessed by these Nattuvanarswas not also of a high standard.

Among them, Meenakshisundaram Pillai of Pandanallur was an exception. He belonged to a great family of teachers and composers of the dance. His grandfather had been in the Court of Maharaja Serfoji of Tanjavur and had done great work in re-editing the form of the dance. Meenakshisundaram Pillai was himself learned in the theory and practice of the art. He was a genius in teaching and he had an infallible eye for beauty of line. But, in the beginning, he was not prepared to teach Rukmini Devi. He thought her interest was merely dilettante and that she would not be prepared to submit to the rigorous discipline, of the dance. In the end, after much persuasion, he consented to teach her but only very tentatively. But when he started to teach her, he was amazed at her aptness and her interest. She worked very hard and, in December 1935, she gave a dance recital before the delegates to the International Convention of the Theosophical Society at Adyar. Kalakshetra was born immediately after this dance recital which stormed the citadels of narrow-minded philistines.

This dance recital was historic. It was the first time a lady of good birth had ever learnt this dance. Her genius and mastery of the technique were apparent even to a lay observer. The dance form was beautifully pure, devoid of sensuality of any sort. It created a revolution in the feelings of the large number of people who witnessed the dance and paved the way for the future popularity of Bharatanatya which was the name by which Rukmini Devi called the Sadir. The dance, in one step, had crossed the threshold from moribundity to the dawn of vigorous life.

In a few months the needed workers and teachers had joined the International Academy of Arts, as it was then named, because of the possibility of an institution of its kind attracting pupils from every part of the world. One cannot but recollect with a sense of thankfulness the early coadjutors Srimati Rukmini Devi secured in some of her friends, like Mr. Alex Elmore and his wife Mary, Sri K. Narayana Menon. Sri P. V. Rajamannar, Dr. Cousins, Papanasam Sivan and a few others who provided sustained help, physically as well as intellectually.

After a Constitution for the Association and Rules were framed with the assistance of Sri Rajamannar, the body was registered in 1936, under the Charitable Societies Act, with ideals and objectives of real connotation and significance. This was the only formal part of it; the rest of the work was done in such an unostentatious way that for more than half a dozen years after its inception, Kalakshetra was not much advertised or publicized. A part from the usual visitors at convention time and entertainments for the assembled delegates of the Theosophical Society, outsiders had only a faint idea of the substantial work that was done for teaching dance and music along authentic lines and under memorable aegis.

Soon, the name of International Academy of Arts was felt to be inadequate to express the spirit of the institution. The name Kalakshetra was proposed by Pandit S. Subramania Sastri, a great scholar and member of the Academy. It was an appropriate appellation to describe the ardour and intense spiritual significance attached by Srimati Rukmini Devi to dance. Everything was done in an informal manner and then accepted as a thing of very normal organic growth. Nothing arose to mar the beauty and adequacy of the name. Every activity only adding to the bloom and aiding its fragrance, spreading with the breeze of a wholesome and permeating culture.

On December 27, 1939, Rukmini Devi gave a dance recital in which history was again made because Sangita Vidwan Papanasam Sivan sang for her dance. Till this time, singing for a dancer was always done by Nattuvanarsand their assistants. No musician of standing would sing for the dance. This was the first time that a great musician had come forward to sing for a dance recital and this was definitely a great step forward.

Early in January 1941, Rukmini Devi after giving a dance recital in Banaras for the International Convention of the Theo­sophical Society, went to Shantiniketan to pay a visit to Rabindranath Tagore on his invitation. The poet was in the early stages of his last illness and was confined to his house “Uttarayan.” However, he insisted on receiving his guests and at his request, Rukmini Devi danced for him, though at the time she had none of her accompanying musicians or instrument-players with her. In spite of this she gave a few inspiring items. Tagore, who was deeply struck by the dance, complimented her and said that after seeing her he had come to a real understanding of Kalidasa’s references to the art of dance.

Another very important development took place at this time which has had far-reaching effects on the development of the dance in India. Sri Meenakshisundaram Pillai and Sri Chockalingam Pillai, for personal reasons, left the service of Kalakshetra. Taking advantage of the situation, which necessitated a change in the teaching staff, Rukmini Devi achieved a new order. She said at the time, “One great new thing that has come as a result of these difficulties is the complete separation of our work from the traditional dance teachers. It is a well-known fact that they are a small clan of people who have never believed it possible for any­body else to conduct a dance performance but themselves. I have always had a determination that this must go. They used to think that except the usual class of people, no one else, would be able to perform a dance. Now there are many girls from good families who are excellent dancers. The second aspect is to train Nattuvanarsfrom good families. I am happy that on Vijayadasami day I was able to prove that we could do without them because our young people and I conducted the Arangetral performance of A. Sarada, another pupil of Kalakshetra who is proficient in giving beautiful dance performances. There have also been one or two other performances of this nature.”

Many years have rolled by and the number of the masters and students has also increased. The quality of Kalakshetra’s education rests not merely on the academic skill of its pupils but on their general attitude to life and the achievement of an unerring taste for true beauty. Much, indeed much, can be said of the untiring work that is done for presentation of our ancient arts in their proper setting as well as with their real aesthetic significance. Rukmini Devi’s main preoccupation has always been in dreaming of a time when this country will eschew the false accumulations and encrustations born of our growing social contacts with the outside world. A pure and unaffected expression of our spirit in everything we do will, according to her, ultimately result in a beautiful creative thing. She longs for the summation of all that we have so far cherished in India as the core of our culture and spiritual attainment.

This is Kalakshetra in its deeper and fundamental inwardness. The outer, if at all one can speak of anything outer for it, is the famous dance-drama which Rukmini Devi has made a thing of utmost enjoyability and enduring value to our inner aesthetic sustenance.

The dance-dramas produced by Rukmini Devi during the past many years have shown Rasikas what a wonderful effect they produce on the minds, especially when the themes chosen are from our great epics and classics. The labours that go into the making of a dance-drama may need perhaps some knowledge in order to assess the devotion and skill which alone could succeed in making them come alive. Songs are set to tunes by eminent musicians, the like of whom are not easily available to other such performers. More than everything, the governing taste for creating something of unusual aesthetic satisfaction for the audience required is which has always been supplied in an abundant measure by Rukmini Devi. Indeed, taste is a thing which has to be inborn even as culture is. May be the two are twins and find a place in the hearts of true artistes. Taste highlights everyone of tae performances at the Kalakshetra, whether it is a Bharata Natyam solo performance of a Dance-drama or a Kathakali representation.

One recollects how the Kuttrala Kuravanji, one of the earliest of its kind, swept the audiences by the rare atmosphere that was created as of a temple environment which breathed of sanctity. The poet who had composed the Kuravanji was himself a rare one of his genre, and naturally the beauty of the songs when set to music by an experienced person like Veena Krishnamachariar (the brother of Tiger Varadachariar) enhanced its appeal. Rukmini Devi in the role of the heroine, Vasantavalli, lent enough charm to make it all memorable.

The desire to present “Kumara Sambhavam” as a dance-drama struck Rukmini Devi when the late Sri K. S. Ramaswami Sastriar, after witnessing the “Kuttrala Kuravanji” with Rukmini Devi herself taking the chief role, said to her that Kalidasa’s poem too should receive her touch of embellishment as a dance-drama. So, in 1947, during the birth centenary celebrations of Dr. Annie Besant, the dance-drama was first put on boards before an audience consisting both of the public of Madras and foreign delegates who had arrived to participate in the Centenary Celebrations of the former President of the Theosophical Society.

Many other dance-dramas have in succession been produced almost every year, but nothing so far has equalled the representa­tion in six chosen episodes of the epic of Valmiki. For long it had its period of incubation and the master-musician, Sangita Kalanidhi Sri Vasudevachariar, both a scholar in Sanskrit and a composer of Kritis, bore the responsibility for setting to delightful music the limpid verses of the immortal bard. Names of the episodes selected are by themselves well-chosen and not the usual ones For instance, ‘Sabari Moksham’, ‘Choodamani Pradanam’ or ‘Maha Pattabhishekam’ gave the performances a dimension of an original nature. Though they are important incidents in the story, the emphasis laid on certain aspects of the theme revealed how much thought had gone into the selection of names which would be expressive of the particular motif of the episode enshrined.

It is not only Sanskrit classics which are drawn upon for themes. Beautiful Tiruppavai enveloping the ‘Andal Charitram’ as a ground was taken up to portray the Bhakti of the ardent devotee in achieving the Lord’s grace. The Divya Prabandham, a storehouse of intoxicating verses of devotional fervour, happened to attain a new dimension in the portrayal of Andal in dance-­sequences of exquisite movement and Abhinaya. It has its parallel only in the ‘Gita Govindam,’ which also Rukmini Devi has presented to the world of Rasikas.

The Bhagavata Mela, the traditional dance-drama of old in the South of India, possesses material suited for representation in an improved manner. Rukmini Devi sought the repositories of this traditional art for lending her the texts of ‘Dhruva Charitram,’ ‘Usha Parinayam’ and ‘Rukmini Kalyanam’ and made out of them wonderful dance-dramas.

Even the play ‘Shyama,’ of Tagore, was contrived to suit the South_Indian taste and presented as a dance-drama during the Tagore Centenary. It proved a fitting homage to the poet whose memory deserves particular cherishment by Kalakshetra, he having been one of its ready patrons.

In her quest for true beauty Rukmini Devi with unerring instinct has produced many a lasting picture of the glory that was Ind. The good fortune of having masters of the art of music to help the dance-drama with their compositions has been one of the reasons for the performance enduring in memory. Artistes such as Tiger Varadachariar, Veena Krishnamachariar, Vasudeva­charya, Papanasam Sivan, Gowri Ammal and Chandu Panikkar are not easily available to many other peformers in our country. Indeed, Rukmini Devi’s aesthetic judgement and devotion to art alone have led her to seek these masters and tend them with care during their stay at the Kalakshetra, Save for a wholesome com­prehensive outlook of art and life as inseparably connected, nothing else could have inspired her to go in for their superior services in making the institution a permanent Kshetra or holy spot for the propagation of genuine art in the time-honoured traditional way.

In this pilgrim’s progress, the theatre, specially designed for Kalakshetra performances, is another unique contribution of Rukmini Devi’s to the presentation of dances to cultured audiences. For nearly two decades and more, the old theatre which had breadth and height from the ground enabling the auditorium’s view unhindered from all angles, met with an accident and collapsed during a cyclone in Madras. But what seemed an unlucky circumstance proved a good augury for the rise of a new construction which is indeed more attractive, combining in itself the architectural beauty of the Koothu Ambalam of Kerala with modern features of a comfortable sitting space for an audience of a thousand. Appukuttan Nair of Kerala famed for his aesthetical perceptiveness in designing buildings has done a great deal to make the whole thing preserve the spirit of sacred­ness of a temple and aesthetical consummation of an artistic structure at one stroke.

May Kalakshetra’s further phase of development be ensured by this fresh environment to its growth.