Baycrest@Home Nova Dance Edition
Between January and March, Nova Dance presented special editions of Discover Dance for Baycrest@home. Neena Jayarajan reflects on the experience below.
“The pandemic pushed us into this space, and the Baycrest@home population helped keep us inspired”
When our Discover Dance season was coming to a close for 2021, Nova Dance wasn’t quite ready to say goodbye to our friends at Baycrest@home. So we offered to keep the program running and gave them a deep dive into the work and process of choreographer Nova Bhattacharya. In January Nova took the audience on a journey through her life in dance using vivid imagery, improvised movement, gesture and storytelling - inviting the viewers to connect with their hearts and minds. It was clear from the insightful questions, in-depth observations, and smiling faces that she succeeded in transcending the medium of zoom, creating a shared emotional experience for us all.
In February Nova took myself and Kieran through a series of exercises, and movement practices she's designed, inviting the audience to join us in whatever way they felt they could participate. Because the imagination is such an important part of Nova's work it was easy for non-dancers to come along the ride with us even if they weren't doing the more taxing physcial parts.
Finally, in March, which happened to fall on the holiday of Holi - a celebration of the coming of Spring with all its beautiful colours and vibrant life, observed by: Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Newar Buddhists, and others all over the world. Nova spoke about colours, and how they inform our mood, our imagery, and our interpretations. I was tasked with interpreting a work from the Nova Dance repertoire with series of visual and mental prompts to layer into the piece, altering its intention, and inspiration. Our Baycrest audience joined in the conversation about how different colours mean different things to each of us. “yellow, black, pink,” what do we feel and think when we hear those colours, how does it change our movements and expressions. I found myself feeling deeply introspective, and channeling memories spanning from my childhood to adulthood. Yellow- the color I wore on stage for the first time, green- the grass I could feel between my toes, white- the clouds that filled the air in the spring after a rainfall. Adding these images and intentions to the piece, left me feeling as though I had created a brand new dance even if the movements were the same.
The program ended with Nova dancing a solo on her balcony, where she threw bright pink powder all over her dancing space and herself. As I watched the viewers giggle with glee I knew that keeping this program going without a break had a resounding impact.
Providing these special programs to Baycrest has been an absolute pleasure to say the least. I think back to our many initial conversations about the collaboration with Baycrest@home and all the things we were hoping to do to make the experiences special for them through Discover Dance. How wonderful that we are also feeling inspired, motivated, and touched by the knowledge and lived experiences shared by our viewers. The pandemic pushed us into this space and the Baycrest@home population helped us keep inspired during still challenging times.