A Gateway to Kathakali - Home

Welcome to Rebecca

11/8/2016

After a world tour with Bryan [her other half], including Kerala Rebecca has joined the Kala Chethena Kathakali Company to help with publicity and marketing. Her brilliant photographic training and skills will bring our projects alive and through social media we hope to keep you all in contact with our activities.

WELCOME TO SOPHIE

8/22/2016

Hi Barbara here - we are delighted to welcome Sophie as a volunteer for the Kathakali - Carnival Heritage Project. Trained in costumes, sets and backstage at Canterbury University Sophie is naturally interested in learning more about the Kathakali costumes and make up. She will be helping with the installation of our Kathakali costumes at Southampton City Art Gallery opening May 13th until 19th August 2017. Handling valuable heritage objects that are sacred will provide a new way of considering how to display an exhibition. Sophie will be coming to the Kathakali costume conservation workshop on Saturday 15th July 2017 at Southampton City Art gallery as one of the varied Activity Days available. Sophie will also be accompanying us as part of our Education Programme to see how we present Kathakali and it`s cultural heritage to a variety of ages. Hope you enjoy your time with us Sophie! If anyone else would like to volunteer please contact us.

WELCOME TO NADINE

8/21/2016

Hi Barbara here - we are delighted to welcome Nadine onto the Kathakali - Carnival heritage project as a volunteer. Nadine`s connection in the Caribbean and the Southampton Caribbean community is brilliant as we can now open this project up to people with links to the Caribbean and not living in Southampton . Everything is going well and if any of you have links to Southampton Carnival, the Caribbean or south India and would like to share your memories and culture as part of the Oral History section we would love to hear from you. please email:[email protected].

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY

8/15/2016

Hi Barbara here - HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY to all the remarkable people of India. Thank you for creating, preserving and sharing some of the most incredible art forms on earth, your philosophy, your food, your culture, your generosity. When I walked across Waga Border in 1972 after travelling thousands of miles overland I felt as if I had come "home" - for so many things THANK YOU India!.

THANK YOU ALICE

8/7/2016

Hi Barbara here - I would like to thank Alice for her valuable contribution to our Kathakali - Carnival Heritage Project especially her research on the Indentured Labourers who went form India to the Caribbean. THANK YOU ALICE! If you would like to share your memories of Kerala, India, Kathakali, the Caribbean or the Southampton Carnival please send me an email for more details - [email protected] - hope to hear from you.

TRIBUTE TO PHOTOGRAPHER MARK BENNETT

8/4/2016

Hi Barbara here - I would like to pay tribute to a very talented person called Mark Bennett - he is the photographer who took the incredible photographs of Kathakali that we are using . Mark asked if he could take photographs of our performance at the 2015 WOMAD Festival, the last performance of the tour. I agreed and invited him backstage to photograph the preparation as well as the performance. Mark was exceptional, very respectful to our culture, a lovely person to be with and of course an outstanding photographer. His photographs are helping us to show the stunning visual images of the Kathakali costumes and the make up but what he has really captured so beautifully is the emotion and the characters of the actors. Thanks Mark for giving us your superb photographs.

I would also like to acknowledge the superb actors who bring the stunning images of Kathakali to life - Kalamandalam Balasubramanian, the ex principal of the Kerala Kalamandalam, is an amazing artist who has devoted his whole life to Kathakali. He is renowned for his portrayal of the heroic characters [green face] and when he performs the room stands still. Kalamandalam Vijayakumar has been performing internationally since 1982 when he toured with the Indian government sponsored Festival of India. He has the rare ability to reach into the heart of the audience through his passion, facial expressions and his remarkable emotions. It has been said that when he comes on stage there is a presence that comes with him that takes the audience into the depth of a Kathakali play. I pay tribute to these wonderful people who are bringing quality authentic Kathakali to the people of this country.

SOUTH INDIANS IN INDONISIA

8/4/2016

Hi Barbara here - I have just got this fist hand information from Prabhakar about people from south India who went to Indonesia as Indentured Labourers.

Prabhakar Dhoopati "Almost everyone spoke Tamil and merged with the majority Tamilians.
So is the case with Telugus. All of them were called 'kalingas'. There were marriages (as all of them were non-brahmins and were from farming communities) among these linguistic groups and the subsequent generation hardly knew their roots. This I learned when I was in Medan, North Sumatra, Indonesia. I really don`t know to what extent this is authentic, though I met a lot of Telugus who called themselves Naidus, married many Tamilians.

Does anyone have any comments on this information and does anyone know if people from Kerala [Malabar] went to Indonesia as Indentured Labourers?

MY JOURNEY FROM INDIA TO SOUTHAMPTON

8/4/2016

Hi, it’s Alice here. It’s not often that you get the opportunity to be fully involved in exciting projects that seem to encapsulate your interests and passions. But when The Kala Chethena Kathakali Company advertised for volunteers to support the Company with their Kathakali – Carnival Heritage Project, I was excited to really get involved and help the project grow.

I have always been fascinated by Indian history and culture. When studying for my degree in History, many of my module choices concentrated on British-Indian history. I have also supported the Mela Festival in Southampton, an incredible one-day festival celebrating all the colour and magic of Indian music and dance. Six weeks spent exploring north India earlier this year only strengthened my interest in Indian culture. The food, the smells, the colours, the heat and the liveliness of Indian life are so strong that they do not fail to infuse into all your senses.

Upon my return from India, I could not wait to get more involved with the Kathakali-Carnival Heritage Project. After my initial meeting with Kalamandalam Barbara Vijayakumar and Kalamandalam Vijayakumar (they said I can call them Barbara and Vijaya for short), it became clear how passionate and committed they both are to the Kathakali traditions. They have both dedicated their lives to ensuring that this ancient tradition is not only maintained in its homeland Kerala but also can be celebrated internationally. They gave me some of DVDs which they produced about the stories and history of Kathakali enabling me to learn more about the meanings and symbolism behind this ancient and classical culture. It is therefore an honour to be working with both Barbara and Vijaya who are working so hard to keep the tradition alive; Barbara through being a Kathakali make-up specialist – the first female in the world and Vijaya as a Kathakali actor. I now have more incentives to help them bring awareness of this wonderful Indian tradition to Southampton.

My role as a researcher is to investigate the history of South Indians who were sent by the British from Indian ports such as Calcutta and Madras and taken to the West Indies to work as indentured labourers on plantations in the Caribbean. From looking at their journey to the Caribbean as well as their life on the plantations, we will begin to better understand the roots and heritage of South Indians and Caribbeans who later came to Southampton to settle.

It has been one year since I graduated from university, so not enough time to forget my researching skills. I will be spending the next week or so with my nose in books, forging through online archives to discover the history of migration and settlement of South Indians in the Caribbean.

I will let you all know what I come across.

KATHAKALI MEETS CARNICAL HERITAGE PROJECT

8/3/2016

Hi Barbara here - we went to the Private View of the New Carnival Company`s exhibition celebrating the life of William Shakespeare showing at Ryde Library, George Street, Ryde, Isle of Wight. The exhibition features the excellent work of local school children who researched, designed and created their own Carnival costumes. A massive congratulations to everyone concerned. We met so many dedicated and experienced Carnival people and looking forward to working with them on our heritage project exploring the history, heritage and similarities between Kathakali and Carnival. The immediate link is the use of symbolic colour!

August 02nd, 2016

8/2/2016

Hi Barbara here - we are going to the Isle of Wight this afternoon to meet the New Carnival Company to discuss the Kathakalali - Carnival Project.

Are you living in Southampton or on the Isle of Wight? Does your family originally come from Kerala, south India or the West Indies?

If so, the Kathakali-Carnival Heritage Project would love to hear from you to learn more about your family and heritage.

Alice has discovered ancient rituals that were taken to the Caribbean from south India, integrated with African traditions to create ceremonies that are unique to the west Indies.

We want to capture this valuable social heritage through an informal interview between yourself and a member of our team which will be filmed and retained by Wessex Film and Sound Archive, Winchester.

If you would be willing to spare your time, please contact Barbara Vijayakumar on [email protected] or call 02380 420114 or 07740123070.

You would be contributing to an exciting project, kindly funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund South East Team. The project will include workshops, performances and an exhibition of stunning Kathakali and Carnival costumes at Southampton Art gallery plus a photographic exhibition at the Dimbola Museum and Galleries, Isle of Wight in 2017.

When you see the majestic Kathakali performances, follow a Carnival procession or dance to Soca music it is easy to forget the enormous journey these exceptional traditions made to emerge as major influences in world culture.

This project aims to honor the unforgettable people who made the transformation from extreme poverty and oppression to a celebration of the human spirit.
We would be delighted to welcome you to go on a journey of discovery where your time, skill and commitment will be highly valued as we expose these wonderful cultures and help us to raise awareness of the people from South India and the Caribbean who preserved them.