Consulate General of India, Shanghai organized a series of performances & lecture-demonstrations by Shanghai Indian Performing Arts Collective at Shanghai Conservatory of Music, Glamor Bar at M on the Bund and Rockbund Art Museum in Shanghai between October to December 2012. The group was led by Dr. Priya Srinivasan, who works as Associate Professor Dance at the University of California, Riverside. She was trained in Indian classical dance and contemporary dance styles in Melbourne Australia and has worked as an artist scholar and choreographer in various parts of the world including USA, Australia, and now Shanghai. Other members of ‘The Shanghai Indian Performing Arts Collective’ who took part in the performances were Minakshi Choudhary, Neesha Zhaveri, Gayathri Ramamurthy, Sashikala Ravi, Thiruchelvy Samuel and You Qi.

The interactive lecture/performance/workshop was aimed at promoting awareness of Indian dance music performance and culture in China. It was also an endeavour to increase critical awareness, create dialog, and promote cultural ties between Indian and Chinese communities in Shanghai.

The performance at Shanghai Conservatory of Music was held on October 31, 2012 where the group spoke on the evolution of music in India, history of Carnatic Music and Music & Feminine energy ‘Yin Qi’. Using Indian classical dances of Kathak, Bharata Natyam and Odissi, the group demonstrated how dance & music are inseparable in Indian Art.

The second performance ‘Performing Literature’ was held at Glamor Bar at M on the Bund on November 23, 2012. Through this presentation, the group animated the writings of Indian authors through song and dance. The presentation included a 3000-year old Vedic sanskritic chant, second century Tamil literary masterpiece known as the Silappatikaram (The Epic of the Anklet), 17th century Telugu love poems, and 21st century English poems and fiction.

The last performance ‘Trinetra: The Third Eye’ was held at Rockbund Art Museum on December 1, 2012. Exploring the understandings of the third eye in Indian and Chinese cultures (While Hindu tradition associates the third eye with the Ajna chakra, Taoism claims that the third eye is one of the main energy centers of the body), the performance explored seeing beyond duality of body/mind, of the spiritual and the material, feeling beyond seeing, and experiencing through the third eye. The show also contained an section depicting struggle of women working in home and outside of it, trying to find a balance between their spiritual lives and the material and social world they live.