We Will Remember This!

Nova Dance has a book! Read about the journey of Nova Bhattacharya as she navigated the creation of Svāhā! through a global pandemic.

Written and Curated by Brannavy Jeyasundaram Foreword by Peggy Baker We Will Remember This: Nova Bhattacharya’s Svāhā! holds a moment in the life of a dance company and its artistic work during the global pandemic. With shuttered theatres and empty rehearsal halls, dance artists searched for new ways of working when all performances stopped and close contact with other bodies wasn’t always possible. Choreographer Nova Bhattacharya had been poised to begin a 75-dancer work when the pandemic hit. Then, she had to reimagine what was at the heart of dance, of the notion of “company”, “ensemble”, a practice based in the body, bodies, multiplicity, proximity, and touch. Through a series of literary essays, this book delves into a key moment in Canada’s dance-making and the resilience of artists.

About the Author Brannavy Jeyasundaram is a writer and dancer living in the Greater Toronto Area. She was classically trained in bharatanatyam by her guru, Shanta Ponnudurai, since she was five years old and completed her arangetram in 2012. As an interpretive planner, Brannavy works to bring public exhibitions to life at the Royal Ontario Museum and was previously the co-executive director of the Toronto Ward Museum. Much of her work is underscored by an effort to understand diasporic will and memory through histories of displacement. Her writing can be found in The Local, Briarpatch, Jacobin, The Dance Current, and Tamil Guardian, among other places.