Through her dance company Kalpanarts, choreographer Kalpana Raghuraman makes work of high artistic quality with social significance and for a diverse audience. Since the beginning of her career Kalpana had the ambition to create a place for Indian dance in mainstream of the Dutch dance landscape. Her explicit choice to combine traditional Indian Bharatanatyam with principles of modern and contemporary dance, makes it unique not only in the Netherlands but also far beyond. Kalpana is a pioneer, both the Indian as contemporary dance lover feels connected to her.

She is the first and only choreographer in the Netherlands to see her Indian dance style in mainstream venues, and she has put all her knowledge and skills to professionalize Indian dance in the Netherlands. Kalpana creates performances in which the dance style Bharatanatyam is combined with contemporary dance. With knowledge of the dance codes and clichés that are used in both ​​dance styles, she bypasses them organically. She strips off the narrative aspect of movements and uses dance to say something about the current times in which we live. Through intimacy and identification, she breaks the exoticism that often is linked with non-western dance for Western audiences. Kalpana is a pioneer and her work is not only valued in the Netherlands but also abroad.

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