Shweta Prachande’s ‘Apah’ reimagines water on stage

Chennai: Bharatanatyam dancer Shweta Prachande explored water beyond its familiar myths and symbols in Apah, performed on Day Two of Natyarangam’s Pancha Bhootha Bharatham festival at Narada Gana Sabha.

The five-day thematic series, hosted by Natyarangam, the dance wing of Narada Gana Sabha Trust, is dedicated to the Pancha Bhootas. Each day focuses on one element, with Apah representing water.

Shweta’s performance leaned into water’s fluidity and capacity to transform — its ability to take the shape of its surroundings — rather than sticking to well-known Puranic narratives of water as life-giving or purifying. She opened with the Apah Sukta, celebrating water as nourishment and strength, before moving to the Nasadiya Sukta and its questioning of the primordial waters of creation. The shift demanded both conceptual clarity from the dancer and an attentive audience, as she navigated abstract ideas through movement.

Shweta was accompanied by Carnatic vocalist Rithvik Raja, with Jayashree Ramanathan on nattuvangam, L. Ramakrishnan on violin, Sumesh Narayanan on mridangam, and J.B. Sruti Sagar on flute.