  The Black reality
Anyone would identify a raven
with a black bird rather than with a crow but the Ravens production,
presented by nATANDA was a journey like no other. Intricately weaving
and twisting the human body into the perception of the crow was the
epitome of the dramatic performance. Instilling a sense of
soul-searching intensity, Sri Lanka’s premiere modern dance troupe
enthralls us to use our senses beyond our normal sight of vision.
With a raw theme revolved around the bird with a black coat that is
negatively perceived picking rubbish and creating annoyance, the stark
revelation that a crow is as beautiful as any other bird was witnessed
in this production. In eleven parts, the performers displayed true
cataclysmic essence that shows how a group of ravens struggle to
coexist. We are taken on their life’s journey of the adult crows giving
birth to young who aren’t labelled.
 Then we see their interaction with the external forces of the world
like pollution, stray animals, hopscotch between the broken glass and
half-eaten curry packets and sewage streams where garbage is burnt.
We are poignantly reminded of their painful plight of blood-stained
beaks and broken bones along the train tracks, of everything and
anything that gives way to the trauma of being born a raven.
The raven production mirrors the plight of the ravens but it is also
a grim reminder of this big bad world we are born into and have to make
the most of life.
The techniques of modern composition, the essence of the drama, its
blood, is as human as is it animal. According to the nATANDA producers
of Ravens, it is a sometimes hostile, brutal, violent, sometimes gentle,
selfless, loving, the raven remains divided, back-and-forth, like us,
but still always finding new ways to survive.
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