As a child growing up in the Potala Palace (Lhasa, Tibet), the Dalai Lama would often climb onto the roof and train his telescope on herds of yaks to take them to market. After seeing them, he would run to a temple room, set aside some of the offerings, instruct a palace employee to buy the entire herd and set them free.
It is this powerful spirit of direct action that prompts us to rehearse an excerpt from the new dance-drama for young people to the beat of the tabla before the scorching sun in Lodhi Gardens. We feel the grass beneath our feet and wake up to the chorus of birdsong, soaking up the natural beauty of Delhi.
No one is too young to find their creative wings and fly. , Photo Credit: Dixit Sharma and Athan Zimik
as screenwriter and mask maker for the production of Star, Compass Crow – A story set in the Indus Valley times with a current environmental message , I got a balcony in Manali which took more than a month to stitch. nonviolence) silk feathers on the largest head-dresses worn by the dancers. While I was working, crows, Himalayan jays, turtle doves were swooping around me. It was time to consider the big questions: Can theater speak to younger generations about important issues such as species extinction and climate change? Is an interactive exhibit the best platform in which to inspire real change for good? As producers, we decided that our shows must be printed on khadi paper, our clothes hand-woven, our sets biodegradable: but will a young audience pay attention to the environmental details? And if so, will it help them to recognize the urgent need for change?
drown the audience
Class X student Vanshika Ahlawat feels optimistic that the eco-theatre audience carries a strong message: “If we continue on the path we are on now, our earth will be destroyed by the time we grow up. But awareness is spreading. I feel mixed emotions: scared, but also lucky to be in India where there is still so much greenery and wildlife,” she says.
Benjamin Jacobs, choreographer, director and principal dancer star, expresses the need to completely immerse the audience from the moment they enter the auditorium. “Even though it’s an indoor space, I want them to feel that theater is a place where they can connect with nature. During the 60-minute performance, I want them to feel gratitude, as if nature is healing them.” It is high time this message was heard especially when 200 species of plants, insects, birds and mammals go extinct every 24 hours.
protest dance
Sundays are spent with groups of young artists making bird masks and planning dances. , Photo Credit: Dixit Sharma and Athan Zimik
While 150 school children danced with human birds in the corridors of a small theater in Delhi, 22 wildfires raged across Britain, a bleak, bleak island in the North Sea. Heatwaves, violent storms and epic floods now occur every day somewhere on the planet. Bill McGuire in his book hothouse earth, Warns that ‘kids born in 2020 will face a far more hostile world than their grandparents’. Our children already know about it and are voicing it.
Eighth grade student Yashita Dhalia confesses that she is “honestly very scared about her future”. however, she feels “a murderer of hope”.
star India’s subcontinent is among friends on stage, where several initiatives explore environmental awareness through performance storytelling. TierraA five-day playshop was organized earlier this year in the Begur forest of Kerala, focusing on climate change, nature conservation and human-animal relationship. Flash mob-style protest dances are taking place by young farmers in Goa’s Mollem forest, where pipelines, high-speed rail tracks and multi-lane highways threaten to destroy the ancient home of several endangered species.
Back in Delhi, our Sundays are spent making bird masks and creating dances with groups of young artists, a process we hope will better connect us all to our natural surroundings, even That even in the heart of the capital. Seeing our students engaged and their joy in imitating the movement of things in the wild gives us confidence that the transformative, healing power of nature can inspire positive change.
bare feet
Heatwaves, violent storms and epic floods now occur every day somewhere on the planet. , Photo Credit: Dixit Sharma and Athan Zimik
No one is too young to find their creative wings and fly. I am transported back to my third year at Cambridge when eco-theatre was in its infancy and only a few brave directors had the intelligence to anticipate the planetary madness ahead. After a year in Guatemala director Rosanna Lowe created the acclaimed piece after observing the conversations of garbage collector children who subsisted on the city’s garbage dump. In his play, the characters communicate through bird sounds and song alone. twenty years later, bbc four Eco-thriller podcast ‘Power Out’, written by award-winning author and activist Sarah Woods, begins with the premise of ‘the world is dying’. It is time to act. McGuire believes it will take some kind of miracle to stop us all from crashing through the 1.5°C climate change guardrail. “It’s a call to arms,” he says. “So if you feel the need to stick yourself to a motorway or block an oil refinery, do it.”
Our response to this call to arms is to create theater inspired by nature, inspired by the energy of the earth beneath our bare feet, our connection to the spirit that makes us stand on a stage, or in the woods, or on the road. inspires us to sing, dance and leap into the unknown.
star compass crow Will travel to Bengaluru in October, Haryana in November and then New Delhi in December.
The author is a teacher and performance artist, currently based at Triveni Kala Sangam, New Delhi. @taracompasscrow