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Lenchinaa
Choreographer: Swadhi Ranganee
Performer: Swadhi Ranganee
Music: Deepa Hettige, Harinda Jayawardana, Dilshan Umayanga, Manoj Peiris, Baliphonics (Susantha Rupathilaka, Prasanna Rupathilaka, Sumudi Suraweera, Reuben Derrick)
All music used with permission of the artist(s) and/or publisher
Livestream Director: Barbara Willis Sweete
World Premiere
Lenchinaa
Wednesday October 7, 2020
Free Livestream
9PM EDT
Recording available until October 18, 2020
Choreographer: Swadhi Ranganee
Performer: Swadhi Ranganee
Music: Deepa Hettige, Harinda Jayawardana, Dilshan Umayanga, Manoj Peiris, Baliphonics (Susantha Rupathilaka, Prasanna Rupathilaka, Sumudi Suraweera, Reuben Derrick)
All music used with permission of the artist(s) and/or publisher
Livestream Director: Barbara Willis Sweete
World Premiere
Swadhi Ranganee’s Lenchinaa explores gendered aesthetics through the medium of Sinhalese folk, traditional, and contemporary dance. Inspired by the mask of Lenchinaa, the flirtatious village beauty of the Kolam tradition, Ranganee’s piece departs from Kolam’s emphasis on comedy while retaining its aim of social commentary, using the mask as a way to focus on the feminized body.
Originally performed by male practitioners, Sinhalese classical dance has transformed through its adaptation out of night-long rituals into the light of the stage and, simultaneously, onto female performers. Dancers often move within gendered parameters; nonetheless, art pushes boundaries, taking the body beyond gender. Ranganee attempts to render such limits and freedoms in her piece, a coming-of-age story in which Lenchinaa finds power, grace, and magic in a journey through movement and dance.
Swadhi Ranganee
Choreographer/Performer
Swadhi Ranganee is a performance artist specializing in Sri-Lankan/Sinhalese traditional (udarata/pahatharata), folk, and modern dance, which she has been practicing for over 20 years. She has additional experience in other South Asian styles, as well as jazz and contemporary, musical theatre, and Latin dancing. She has danced in numerous local events, festivals, and private functions across Ontario and Quebec. Recent artistic highlights include dancing in Expect Theatre’s dance and spoken word production for Nuit Blanche Toronto (2015), as well as developing and facilitating a community dance program funded by the Platform-A Emerging Artist program (2016). She is also engaged in researching and writing about Sinhalese performance arts, as she is passionate about bringing these traditions to wider recognition.
Photo credits: Robert Vibert/RSV Photography
Night Shift is produced with the support of the City of Toronto through Toronto Arts Council, and made possible (in part) by the Government of Canada.
Night Shift is co-presented with Fall for Dance North.
