CHENNAI: A transdisciplinary performance, Maya unfolds at the intersection of movement, sound, visual art, and light, offering an immersive meditation on identity, ancestry, perception, and the feminine creative force.
Drawing from Bharatanatyam and Kuchipudi, alongside Carnatic music and a visual installation, the work reimagines maya not simply as illusion, but as a lived condition shaped by presence and awareness.
“Maya is not something we step into. It is something we are already inside of. The work asks us to pause and notice that condition,” says Vijay Palaparty, choreographer and curator.
Situated between the known and the unformed, Maya reflects on how reality is perceived, experienced, and continually reshaped. Rather than offering fixed meanings, the work invites audiences into a contemplative space where understanding emerges through embodied experience, listening, and attention.
The work draws inspiration from the musical legacy of master composer Vidwan Madurai N Krishnan, and the choreographic traditions of seminal dance artistes Sudharani Raghupathy and K Uma Rama Rao.
The creative team includes Vijay Palaparty (Dance and movement), Ramya Kapadia (Music), and Shanthi Chandrasekar (Visual art), whose combined practices shape an immersive experience that foregrounds presence and awareness.
Describing the installation, Shanthi Chandrasekar shares, “I use intricately hand-punched paper layered with mirrors so that light, shadow, and reflection continuously shift as the viewer moves.
The work changes depending on where you stand, reminding us that perception itself is never fixed.”
Maya will be staged on January 25 at Spaces in Besant Nagar at 10.15 am. Entry is free for the audience.