A dancer, puppeteer, theatre artiste and curator of two popular auditoriums in the city— this multi-talented Kannada hudugi is on a high as she's added another feather to her cap. Meet 24-year-old Varshini Vijay who’s bagged the contract to manage KH Kala Soudha, one of south Bengaluru's most popular cultural centres, which was unfortunately shut for a year and a half.
A lady with a strong cultural background, Varshini is also curator at Prabhath Kala poornima and KEA Prabath Rangamandira, “I’ve been in this field for the last three years.
Since there was a huge controversy that was spiraling around KH Kala Soudha, they called for a tender, so we went ahead and put it. Once we bagged it, we started renovating the place and we're planning to open it on November 11th,” beams Varshini.
The art aficionado is revamping the old auditorium to give it a brand new look for artistes across the city to be able to perform comfortably. “This is really special for me as the first time I danced and the first time I did theatre was at this venue! So, I have a personal connection with the place. Earlier, it was an old, broken down building, but now, we want to give the best equipment etc that is available in the industry. The venue will be open to anything that's cultural or art-oriented,” she shares.
As someone who comes from a family of artistes and dancers, Varshini grew up with a liberal dose of art around her. “I’ve learnt both Bharatanatyam and Kathak. When I was 16, my great grandfather introduced me to Harikathe, a form of traditional storytelling and I started to perform independently,” reveals the computer science engineer who decided to get a diploma in storytelling from the University of Edinburgh. Soon, she met a teacher who also a puppeteer and this versatile artiste added took to learning puppetry. “I came across a concept where people introduced breathing into puppetry and I’ve been exploring how to do that and incorporate it in our style of storytelling or theatre. I belong to a theater company called ‘We Move Theatre’ and I perform with them. Right now, I'm trying to put together dance, theatre and puppetry on the same platform where three major classical arts come together,” she reveals.
A proper south Bengaluru girl, Varshini states that the Eat Street in VV Puram is one of her favourite hangouts. When she’s not at the auditorium, she's looking for shows in places like Rangashankara to bring back to her spaces or she just sits and sketches at home. “I also enjoy discussing new mechanisms about puppetry with my grandpa. Also, our main aim is to provide sustainability for artistes where they can do their parallel work in their art field and also work with us. We’re particular about hiring artistes to work for us.”
