Ratna Roy
Ratna Roy was
trained in India in classical Orissi dance, initially in both the women’s
(mahari) and the men’s (gotipua) traditions by Guru Govinda Chandra Pal
and subsequently in the classical tradition that evolved from the "mahari"
tradition, by Padmashri Guru Pankaj Charan Das. She is one of the few remaining
dancers who practice the women’s dances in classical Orissi style, including
the Panchakanya (Five Virtuous Women). Since 1977, she studied under Guru
Pankaj Charan Das, the guru of gurus, son of a Mahari (temple dancer) at
the Jagannatha Temple in Puri. It has now become her mission to teach and
spread the unique dance style and tradition of her guru. Ratna Roy has received
two Fulbrights, an American Institute of Indian Studies Fellowship, the
National Endowment for the Arts Choreography Award, and the Arts International
Award for her dance and has performed and conducted workshops internationally.
Her latest research work is in dance for self-empowerment of women and dance
therapy using the idiom of the classical Orissi dance.
Ratna has performed in several countries, including India, North America, Great Britain, the Baltics, Indonesia, Singapore, China, Japan, the Philippines, and South Africa. She did a performance and workshop at the NGO Forum of the UN Conference on Women in China in 1995 and toured the Kansai area in Japan with a Japanese company, Lasenkan, in 1996. In addition to her work teaching at The Evergreen State College, and developing an accredited three year curriculum in Orissi dance there, Ratna has her own Dance Company, Urvasi, made up of her most advanced dancers. Several dancers, trained by Ratna, are now performing in the United States, Canada, and Japan. She was invited by the Philippine Educational Theatre Association ( PETA) to conduct a two-week workshop in the Philippines, April 1998. Ratna presented a paper, "Gender Constructs in Orissi Dance," and gave a workshop at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, July of 1999. Most recently she gave workshops at Nrityagram, Bangalore, India (May 2000) and at the Odissi Dance Academy, Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India (December 2003). In India, she also performed at the Konarak Festival in February 2001, at the Habitat Centre in New Delhi for "Shraddhanjali" in December 2001, all five of the Pancha Kanyas at the Bharatiyam Cultural Complex in Kolkata (December 27, 2003), and as a master dancer at the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi (June 18, 2004). In her performances in India she was accompanied by Sri Ghana Shyam Panda and Minati Bhanja on voice, Sri Dhaneswar Swain on mardala, Sri Ramesh Chandra Das on violin, Sri Jyoti Mishra on sitar, and Sri Parasuram Das on the flute.
A scholar, as well as a performer and choreographer, most recently, Ratna Roy was featured in the "Angasoundarya" presentations during the Second Odissi Dance Festival in Washington, DC, in August 2003. She presented her paper on the Pancha Kanya in the Mahari repertoire of Guru Pankaj Charan Das at a National Seminar in Kolkata, India, in December 2003. She also presented her paper on the alternative narratives in Odissi Dance at the Barbara Stoler Miller Conference at Columbia University, New York, in February 2004.
