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ANN ARBOR, U.S.A., February 4, 2004: 2004 is the centenary year of Rukmini Devi, a luminary in Indian dance. She was born in Pudukotthai in South India 100 years ago and this month, two programs at the University of Michigan Museum of Art in Ann Arbor, Michigan, celebrate Rukmini Devi’s contributions to bringing the South Indian temple dance known as Bharatanatyam, into the modern era and rescuing it from oblivion. The first performance, “A Conversation with Tradition: An Evening of Classical and Contemporary Indian Dance,” took place on February 5. The second, a family program of Indian dance, is on February 15. It also includes gallery events and hands-on activities. Madhavi Marcia Mai studied Bharatanatyam at the performing arts college Rukmini Devi established near Chennai, in India and teaches at Oakland University in Rochester and at her own Sadhana Studio in Ann Arbor. She dances in both UMMA performances. Mai notes that Rukmini Devi herself never saw Bharatanatyam until the 1930s. The style had nearly disappeared, after two centuries of British rule that had deleterious effects on all Indian performing arts.

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