For Malavika Sarukkai, the award-winning Indian classical dancer, her craft is almost always inspired by experiences that moved her. The Bharatanatyam artiste won the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 2002 and was honoured by the Government of India in 2003 with Padma Shri, the fourth highest Indian civilian award.Her latest production, Anubandh – Connectedness, which she has been performing all over Asia since the beginning of the year, was galvanized by the effects of the COVID pandemic on our world. “Anubandh is an ode to the transformational power of hope during a time of uncertainty, isolation and panic. The pandemic disconnected human beings in unprecedented ways, and that is not our natural state. Innately, we are all connected, to each other, to the planet and to a common consciousness. When the pandemic took this away, I felt an urgent need to speak on the need to be connected. That is how Anubandh came about,” says the artiste who was just back from her performance in Singapore. Malavika made her dance debut at the age of 12. She went on to perform at many venues across the world, including the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, New York, John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and others. She performed Anubandh in Bengaluru a couple of months ago.
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