How Mallika Sarabhai straddles the two worlds of art and art management with ease

In December 2022, dancer Mallika Sarabhai was appointed Chancellor of Kerala Kalamandalam, a deemed university. With her background as a performing artiste, the Padma Bhushan awardee brings to the institute her four-decade experience of successfully running the Darpana Academy of Performing Arts, Ahmedabad, besides a Ph.D in organisational behaviour and an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad.

In the present scenario, prominent Indian performing arts institutions need to recreate performance formats, human resource development and, most of all, cultural and economic sustainability. Only then can these institutions continue revitalising and preserving performing arts’ complex socio-economic and aesthetic ecology. And, Mallika symbolises the ideal cultural ambassador with her multifaceted skill set.

India’s currency of cultural tradition is vast, and the number of cultural centres and bodies in public and private spaces is numerous. However, the lack of managers and leaders for Indian cultural organisations and no cultural management degree programme in the various Indian management institutes of global standing is worrying.

Mallika is excited about her new role
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement

Nurturing talent

Having done a Cultural Management Fulbright program at the Smithsonian Centre for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, it is exciting to meet Mallika, who was recognised as a global cultural leader by the World Economic Forum at Davos in 2009. As I climb up the steps to her modest apartment on the Darpana Academy premises, a majestic peacock honks sitting fearlessly on the lower window pane. Wearing a long red and blue gypsy skirt and blue top, Mallika opens the door. Here is the muse of Peter Brook, who chose her at the age of 15 to play Draupadi in his path-breaking nine-hour stage play  The Mahabharatha (1985). Mallika is now busy with her highly successful production  The Conference of the Birds, an adaptation of the 12th century Persian Sufi Farid Ud-Din Attar’s poem about a metaphorical psychological journey. “I welcome you to my world of birds and flights of mind. Ever since I started the production, bird feathers fall in the most unusual places around me,” she says with a smile.

The production, one of the many directed by Yadavan Chandran, represents Mallika’s ability in creating avant-garde expressions of artistic productions and nurturing talent. For instance, she narrates, “The masks are designed by Margaret Matteson but executed by our Pandarinathan, who has painted all over Darpana. Each bird represents a diverse human quality and reflects the existential magical reality of performed identities in which we all live. The hoopoe stands for wisdom, the falcon for power, the parrot for freedom, the sprightly sparrow for energy, the peacock for pride, the nightingale for love, and the heron for self-centred existence.” At Darpana, it is an experience to see Mallika’s leadership come alive throughout the day. On production night, each institution member multitasks. There is simplicity, teamwork and reduced hierarchies.

From ‘The Conference of the Birds’
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy: Darpana Academy of Performing Arts

Crucial role

As part of cultural revival and nationalism, dance traditions between the 1930s and the 1940s were repositioned from temples, courts and courtyards of urban elites into institutions. These organisations played a pivotal role in moulding a new category called the ‘classical’ Indian dance. Among these are institutions such as Kalamandalam, Santiniketan, Kalakshetra, and Sangit Bharati (that grew into the Kathak Kendra and Shriram Bharatiya Kala Kendra). Under the leadership of doyens such as Rukmini Arundale, Nirmala Joshi, Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay and Kapila Vatsyayan, members from traditional artistic communities, especially the male gurus, were inducted into these institutions to bring a new class of practitioners, widen audiences, address transmission systems, and build a repertoire for the new performance space of the proscenium.

Mallika says she is “honoured and excited to head Kalamandalam. It is a challenge. After all, there are 900 people, beginning from the age of 12. Hence, there are variations in strength and expectations. It is in a time warp — from buildings and ideas on teaching to some traditions that have become unspoken rules. I have met all groups of people, from security guards to students and teachers, to assess their issues, where they see failures, the solutions, and what they would like the institution to be. I am fortunate to have a team (vice-chancellor Dr. Narayanan and registrar Dr. Rajesh) who share my views and values. We aspire to address gender, class, and caste issues,and create inclusivity and neutrality. We aim to bring a balanced dialogue between technology and the classical performing arts. I aim to create a well-designed strategy to fulfil short, medium, and long-term objectives to provide a new direction to the performing arts traditions embedded in this institution,” she elaborates.

The description of Kalamandalam reflects the health of most performing arts institutions. Each one requires not just successful performers and scholars but visionaries equipped with experience in the grassroots related to specific performing art communities. Besides, they need cultural management training, and should be able to create regional and global connections, synced with modern technology, be aware of cultural economics to link tradition with innovative services and products with new markets and audiences.

This is where someone like Mallika steps in.

Yadavan Chandran
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy: Darpana Academy of Performing Arts

Yadavan’s creative space

Filmmaker, theatre director, actor, graphic designer and photographer Yadavan Chandran was fresh out of college when he came to Darpana. “A camera was put in my hands, and Mallika asked me to conceptualise and shoot a series of music videos. After that, there has been no looking back. I have tried something new and different in each production and video. That freedom is essential,” says Yadavan.

Talking about the making of ‘The Conference of the Birds’, he says, “My aim was to make everything fly: the space, the characters, and the audiences’ minds! The unique design of the Natrani amphitheatre allowed my creation to be all-enveloping.”