BHUBANESWAR: Till date, Gotipua, a century-old dance form of Orissa, where young boys dressed as girls enact excerpts from the life of Lord Krishna and Radha, was limited to social events. For the first time in the cultural calendar of the State, the Tourism Department will be organising a Gotipua Dance Festival in collaboration with the Guru Kelucharan Mohapatra Odissi Research Centre. Art connoisseurs can witness this festival at the Rabindra Mandap from November 15 to 17. An 11-member committee of eminent artistes, scribes and government officials have selected the groups who would perform at the festival. “Earlier, Gotipua was just staged at social and religious events but there was no festival dedicated to the dance form. Hence, we have decided to organise this festival and considering its popularity, it would be made an annual event,” said Aruna Mohanty, eminent Odissi dancer and committee member. The inaugural will see performances by Konark Natya Mandap and Chandrasekhar Gotipua Kala Samsad from Brahmagiri. Artistes from Natyamber Gurukula, Natyamber Dimirisena, Laxmipriya Gotipua Nrutya Kendra, Dashabhuja Gotipua Nrutya Parishad, Orissa Dance Academy and Nilakantheswar Gotipua Gurukula will perform during the festival. As part of the festival, a two-day seminar on ‘Gotipua Dance’ would be organised at the festival venue.
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