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IN SEARCH OF RICH CULTURAL HERITAGE
PRESS RELEASE: NRTIYA NANDAN
Nritya Nandan a dance School established by Ms. Sharmila Banerjee in the early nineties stands for
uncompromising aesthetic standards in Dance and has its foundations on the hard work and
dedication of both the Guru and her young disciples. From years of experience Sharmila Banerjee has
formed a unique style of dance used in its compositions, traditional yet having a contemporary
appeal.
Since its inception Nrtitya Nandan has been working to popularize and spread different classical dance
forms like Manipuri, Bharatnatyam, Odissi along with contemporary and folk dance forms from
different parts of the world. Not only as a medium of entertainment but also to uphold the sense of
rich taste and aesthetics beauty through dance, is Nritya Nandan’s goal.
Nritya Nandan has been working in collaboration with Rikskonsertene (Concerts Norway) for the past
three years. Concerts Norway is Norway’s largest communicator of live music, and owned by the
Ministry of Culture and it is engaged in a number of collaborations with partners in Africa, The Middle
East, Asia and South America, on assignment from the Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In the
previous collaborations, Norwegian folk dancer Ulf- Arne Johannessen visited Bangladesh in
November 2011 and in againg in September 2012 acoompanied by another talented dancer Margit
Myhr to conduct successful workshops and presentations with the dance students from Nritya Nandan
and other dance institutions, organized by Nritya Nandan in association with the Royal Norwegian
Embassy, Dhaka and Livesquare. Nritya Nandan has also visited Norway in 2012 and 2013, in the
same collaborating program to conduct workshops in Norwegian Folk High Schools with Mr.
Johannessen and Ms. Myhr and also to participate in school concerts with the Norwegian band Trio
Nattergal. In March 2013 Nritya Nandan perform in the Jaffna Music Festival under the invitation of
Rikskonsertene along with popular Bangladeshi music band Chirkutt.
This year Nritya Nandan has taken a project titled “Celebrating Life in Rhythm” in collaboration with
Rikskonsertene (Concerts Norway). The objective of the project is to present children of this
generation with the taste of their cultural heritage, in this case dance only. It mainly aims to
contribute towards creation of awareness and knowledge about dance as a heritage in performing
arts, to create a sense of appreciation among children for dance and body language and to create a
link between the local and the global, through introduction to dance styles both South Asian classical,
folk and contemporary as well as few western styles.
Nritya Nandan will be visiting 3 schools in Dhaka (Viquarunnisa School and College, Sunnydale, Brac’s
school for underprivileged children) from 1st-4th and 16th-17th September 2014, and 2 schools in
Chittagong (Little Jewels and BITA) from 7th-10th September 2014. The program will begin with the
introduction of structure of dance, rhythm, roots of dance from nature, Bengali folk forms, Tagorean
and creative dance forms, a few western and global dance forms (that are used in dance
compositions with Bengali songs) with live performances, narrations and audio visual
presentations, giving the children a good idea on what kind of dance is performed in Bangladesh.
Since children will be able to relate to nature easily, thematic performances on beauty of nature and
also how nature is affected and harmed through human activities, will be presented, so that children
can see how elements of nature are incorporated in the body movement, hand gestures. The dancers
will interact with the children where they will emphasize on encouraging students to come out of their
introversion and try to move their bodies in rhythm. This process will particularly try to stimulate
confidence within the body, and also engage their imaginative minds into creation process. At the
end, the children will be given the floor to ask questions on their curiosity and queries dance in
general and what they observed during the program. Besides that, they will also be provided with a
questionnaire that would also include general questions on their take on dance, and also specific
questions on the program.
The outcome of this program is assumed to:
Temporary Address:
“Charmville Apartments”, Flat-1002
169, Green Road, Dhaka-1205.
Phone: 0088-9141134, 0088-01716-424810
Email: nrityanandan@yahoo.com
F× mvs¯‹…wZK HwZ‡n¨i A‡š^lvq
IN SEARCH OF RICH CULTURAL HERITAGE
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increase children’s knowledge about own cultural heritage,
transforming and sharing of knowledge, performing arts through dance,
create a sensitivity and taste of appreciation towards own culture and heritage,
to help them acquaint themselves with global cultural experience by observing & sharing,
to help children to be responsive to their bodies and help to overcome their introversion, and
develop confidence in them.
It will also create a sense of solidarity between them, as they all get know more about their own
cultural heritage as well as work in groups together in experimental dance creation process.
Nritya Nandan has always worked with the goal of ‘molding a person to human’, not simply creating
performers. Approach of dance education play vital role to encourage young people to increase
knowledge, transfer & practices own cultural heritage participating through dance education. Nritya
Nandan and Rikskonserterne’s (Concerts Norway) joint initiative can contribute in exploration
of young minds in performing arts, enhancing spirit and team attitude and develop sensitivity and
awareness about nature and humanity and secularism. This intervention could bring major
contribution to new innovating ideas for global community, and also act as an aid to the inclusion of
dance in educational institute as a curriculum in future.
Temporary Address:
“Charmville Apartments”, Flat-1002
169, Green Road, Dhaka-1205.
Phone: 0088-9141134, 0088-01716-424810
Email: nrityanandan@yahoo.com