Indian Council for Cultural Relations and U.S. Embassy New Delhi collaborate with “Battery Dance”

NEW YORK CITY, NY (TIP): Sandeep Chakraborty, Consul General of India in New York, will host a reception at the Consulate on Sunday, January 7th, 2018, providing an elegant send-off for Battery Dance on the day before the lower Manhattan-based company begins a national tour of India, with performances and workshops in Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Kolkata and New Delhi. The event will be an opportunity to obtain a sneak preview of the India tour.

Battery Dance, founded and directed by Jonathan Hollander in 1976, has been a cultural bridge-builder between the U.S. and India for the past quarter-century. Cross-cultural collaborations have included SONGS OF TAGORE that traversed 17 cities in the Indian subcontinent in 1997 during the 50th Anniversary of Indian Independence; and LAYAPRIYA, which toured six major metro cities in 2001. Hollander and Battery Dance have presented many of the foremost dancers and musicians of India in New York and on national US tours and annually at its Battery Dance Festival in conjunction with the Indo-American Arts Council, an institution that Hollander co-founded and on whose Board he serves.

The current India tour features SHAKTI: A Return to the Source, previously named The Durga Project, which was premiered as the centerpiece of the Company’s 40th Anniversary Season in New York in 2016 and which subsequently toured the U.S. and Sri Lanka. SHAKTI is a collaboration between Indian classical dancer Unnath Hassan Rathnaraju and the 5 principal dancers of Battery Dance – Robin Cantrell, Mira Cook, Bethany Mitchell, Sean Scantlebury and Clement Mensah. The work was inspired by the rendition of Raag Durga as recorded by the Hindustani master vocalists Rajan & Sajan Mishra who have given special permission to use their recording and who will attend the final performance of the tour in New Delhi.

The Consulate General of India, New York will be a co-sponsor in the company’s 37th Annual Dance Festival which is scheduled for August 2018 to be held in New York City where they will continue their tradition of presenting Indian dance with a special performance on India’s Independence Day, August 15th, 2018.

SCHEDULE OF PERFORMANCES:

Mumbai – January 11, St. Andrew’s Auditorium

Pune – January 13, Yashwantrao Chavan Auditorium

Bangalore – January 20, Ravindra Kalakshetra

Kolkata – January 24, Kala Mandir

New Delhi – January 31, Kamani Auditorium

For more information: Jonathan Hollander: jonathan@batterydance.org 212-219-3910