Urban Kali. Image by Heidrun Lohr
Doctoral presentation 2017 Lennox Theatre, Parramatta Riverside Theatres, Australia
In this new work, as part of her doctoral presentation, Rakini Devi explored the sensory dimensions of the body’s narrative that focuses on the female form as ritual and artefact. By reconstructing female iconography, and by embodying both Indian and Western aesthetics, the ‘hybridised’ body became a site for artistic dialogue.Through her interrogation of contemporary cultural constructs of female identity, Devi situated Kali iconography within a secular urban landscape.
Urban Kali follows on from Devi’s production of Kali Yuga (Riverside Theatres, 2004), which was part of a trilogy of dance productions based on the Hindu Goddess Kali, spanning 25 years. In this full-length solo work, Rakini collaborated with sound and video artist Karl Ockelford, to integrate film, her own visual art, dance, and installation.
Review: Face to Face with Kali:
“Urban and atheist as I am, I might not believe in Kali, but I welcome the emotionally complex connotations that swirl about her and acknowledge that for a secular society she has the power to evoke the sheer scale of the epic recurrency, individual and social, of the glory and the trauma that constitute life and death. Rakini Devi has given me a Kali to keep and reflect on.”
Keith Gallasch for Realtime