“A beautiful, meditative piece... its transportive qualities fulfilled my desire for immersive art in a way that I have been desperately missing.”
Bharatanatyam choreographers Ranee Ramaswamy and Aparna Ramaswamy’s Fires of Varanasi: Dance of the Eternal Pilgrim evokes an elaborate ritual where time is suspended and humans merge with the divine. Through images that reflect the cosmic trinity of Varanasi, India—sacred pilgrimage routes, the Ganges River, and the patron deity Shiva, heightened by the chants of Vedic priests—the choreographers imagine a metaphorical crossing place where one may leave the mundane and enter into the world of immortality.
“With the death of our father/grandfather away from his homeland of India four years ago, we became part of an age-old tradition that accepts life and death as an integrated whole. A devout Hindu, his desire was for his ashes to be scattered in the Ganges River in the sacred city of Varanasi, India, just as our ancestors before him. In this theatrical reimagining, we expand upon the birth-death-rebirth continuum in Hindu thought to honor immigrant experiences of life and death in the diaspora.
The transformation of the soul after cremation becomes a powerful symbol for human resilience and the tenacity of people and cultures across time. In this full-length work for 10 performers with an original, recorded score, French scenic and lighting designer Willy Cessa transforms the stage as the performers traverse the iconic stairways and landings along the river banks, performing ritual ablutions in the sacred river.”
—Ranee Ramaswamy and Aparna Ramaswamy
The Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C.
The Joyce Theater, New York, New York
Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH
Harris Theater for Music and Dance, Chicago, IL
Northrop at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
The Soraya at Cal State Northridge, Los Angeles, CA
American Dance Festival, Durham, North Carolina
International Soorya Festival, Kerala, India
“A spiritual ode to the city of all cities… for a few moments, time and place transcended to ancient rituals… there was magic in the air, and we were spellbound.”
“Still living and reliving the beauty of it all… Truly ethereal, a prayer where for a few hours, time and place transformed.”
Lead commissioner: The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts
Co-commissioned by the Harris Theater for Music and Dance
Co-commissioned by and developed in part at the Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth College and The Younes and Soraya Nazarian Center for the Performing Arts, Cal State Northridge and Northrop, University of Minnesota
With additional commissioning support from: Jay and Susie Gogue Performing Arts Center at Auburn University; Meany Center for the Performing Arts at the University of Washington; the American Dance Festival; and The Joyce Theater Foundation's Stephen and Cathy Weinroth Fund for New Work.
Fires of Varanasi is made possible in part through grants from the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; the National Endowment for the Arts; the Marbrook Foundation; The MAP Fund, supported by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation; New Music USA, made possible by annual program support and/or endowment gifts from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, Baisley Powell Elebash Fund, & The Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation; the Fredrikson & Byron Foundation; the APAP Cultural Exchange Fund; American Dance Abroad; Ranee and Aparna Ramaswamy's 2018 Guggenheim Fellowships; Ranee & Aparna Ramaswamy's 2020 McKnight Fellowship; a residential fellowship at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center in Italy; and a residency at the Bogliasco Foundation in Genoa, Italy.
