An Odissi dancer from Trinidad, Vinod Kevin Bachan says that his love for Odissi classical dance form brought him to India to start all over again. Vinod Kevin Bachan, a senior disciple of illustrious Ranjana Gauhar, stands tall among Odissi exponents.
Reaching this platform, however, has not come easy to Bachan. His arduous journey in pursuit of mastering Odissi began at home. "I come from a traditional background, where dancing [as a profession] for men is considered odd. While my mother was supportive throughout, it took my father some time to warm up to the idea," he shares, adding that he began with learning kuchipudi for seven years in Trinidad, before he came across an Odissi dancer who had come on an Indian government scholarship to the island nation. "She opened my eyes to how Odissi could be taken up as a career. I trained under her for some time to arm myself with basic knowledge of the dance form. And then it was time to come to India," he says.
Bachan gave up his studies in computer science and arrived in Bhubaneswar in 2009. But despite taking up rigorous training in Odissi, he felt something was missing. "I finally found my guru in Ranjana Gauhar ji, and moved to Delhi in 2013," he says, speaking of the Odissi exponent, choreographer, writer and filmmaker, who received the Padma Shri in 2003. A firm believer in the guru-shishya tradition, Bachan plans to stay on in Delhi to continue learning every day from Gauhar.
"Odissi has acrobatic movements, too, but a performance cannot be just about that," says Bachan. "It is, after all, a dance form that brings temple sculptures to life, where the music it is performed to can take you to another realm, and the expressive style of which becomes a conduit for your inner feelings."