"untamed donkeys" is a outdoor  performance with 7dancers from indian origin.

About the performance 

The work is a reaction to the resent crimes against women in India. Thought this is a global phenomenon the work investigates into the gang raps that have become frequent from past few years in India as its case study. One must think this is the outcome of suppressed mindset, and solution is never going to be achieving by punishment.
The reasons of suppression might as well be in the very early, very basic theory of an "ideal boy" present in every culture. Further the objectification of women, the conservative approach in relations between men and women in the patriarchal system, misconception of masculinity, religious suppression and everyday violence might very well be the reasons behind developing the suppressed mindset.
So the project reflects up on these overlooked connections (which we never pay attention to in general) between the behavior of the youth and what are they have been experiencing,
Approach is to reflect rather than confront the societies on these issues, with seven male dancer & seven black boards, they write and move accordingly, stumping and creating these suggestive structures to portray the physic of the male mind. The work is using black boards and chalks the one which is used in the schools as a metaphor for the cultural and dissemination of knowledge in India. The aim of the work is to deconstruct the upbringing of men in particular and shed light of the social stigma associated body.
The movement ideas were developed for the different social, popular culture and political situation which has men gathering in groups and working as a mob to get a to an particular result doctored by the social system, like the act of conquering a land, let phenomenon of brother hood, the culture of groupies in religions, in teens, in working class people, in immigrants etc.. The work addresses the after effect of such gathering which normally turns into violence of some kind. The male anxiety that is created by the social hierarchy is the centre subject matter of the work.
The performances will be in public spaces. The reason to put the work out of the theatre is to talk about the subjects which are considered as unspeakable in public sphere. This designed to encourage the audience to look at the system for change. This hour long performance at the time of down between 17 to 18 hour .Work will be performed in the transition time of people between work place and returning to regular life.

premiered at Greenland square, Oslo on 23rd of June 2016. with additional performances in  5 Norwegian cities Drammen, Raufoss, Gjøvik, Lillehamar & Lillestrøm.
Prior to the performances the company Xproarts have been on residency at Niv art centre new delhi, India. where the residency period was concluded with 7 work in progress sharing, in New Delhi area at NIV, sadulajab Park, Sri Nivas puriand & NSD campus. In Old delhi we performed in three locations Salam balk Trust, Tees Hazari, Chandini Chowck Park.
After each session we had public feedback talks which helped us a lot to go deeper in the process.
Then we had another four weeks of residency/rehearsals time at R.E.D, Eina ,Norway. Before the Norwegian premier on 23rd June 2016.

Now the performance is ready for its Indian Premier. It will be performed in local areas of Delhi NCR, from last week of oct till first week of Nov. 2016.

-Dancing how man think"

news report prior to the performance at Lillehamer, 28th June 2016.

Dancing against Demons"

News Report after the performance in Gjøvik, 29th June 2016

History- the research for the performance was carried out in Dec 2014- Jan 2015, in Delhi NCR (outdoors as well as movement development) The research involved field trip to different regions in and around Delhi, developing movement motives in the studio, presenting short section of work to get an feel and pulse of the audience .The main objective was to get an deeper understanding of the subject we are working with. We spend time investigating one idea from every possible perspective. This process has helped us to rethink and retrain our self to look at performance and its place in the present times differently. So we want to define “Untamed Donkeys” as a work ,which floats between a performance and a protest, between self reflective and being a mirror to the culture.

NOTE- Aim is not to discriminate any race or culture; the performance will not use nudity or any Anti- National remarks or will not hurt any religious sentiments

Performers:
Sanjay Khan
Sumesh Vazhukkal Myilswamy 
Rahul Chhetri
Lalit Khatana
Vijay Rawat
Deepak Kurki Shivaswamy Sudesh Adhana

Choreographer:
Sudesh Adhana

Project Funded by
Art council Norway

Oppland culture

Residency Partners
R.E.D, Eina, Norway
NIV art Centre, New Delhi, India 

           ACCEPTANCE OF THE PROBLEM IS HALF OF THE SOLUTION ALREADY !!!!!!!

Performance videos
street version part 1 - https://vimeo.com/manage/230413477/general
stage version part 1- https://vimeo.com/manage/245501387/general

performance pictures from Chandini Chowck Park, Old delhi,

A spl. experience to share our performance work at Chandini Chowck, Odl Delhi, with out the permission of the Park attendant !
this was 4th work in progress public sharing, very spl. crowd very spl. place

work in progress showings, a site near tees hazri, Old delhi,

work in progress showings in Delhi

This was a site near tees hazri, Old delhi, the performance is not made for children, but it was a lot of children their ,which made the topic even more curious " why does rapes Happen?"

this was the 3rd of the 7 public showings. very interesting site 

Blckboard an Object to project ur subject.

since I thought of using the black boards as the part of set design. its thought which made sense for performance..I am wanting to use 7 black boards. the exact size and measurement is still to be find out.
I see the balck boards as the object, which was used to transmit information from teachers to us the students ..from our culture to us , the ones who went to school to be educated ( to cultivate our minds which were just instinctive like the animals  ..to be  cultured, to understand what kind of socitey are we going to be part of ..what is the relegion of this society..what kind of subjects are existing in this society ..how developed are we ?what is our history ?..what is the history of the world? what is the grammar of our language and other languages? ..in those early years blackboard seemed to be the place we gazed and gazed. some time the mathematical formulas other times notes from our teacher and then some time we wrote slang ..the name of the body parts which were tabu in our culture
( CHOOT(posy):::LAND(Dick)::ChOOOdo(fuck fuck), CHUTAD( ass)  and so much more .some times , we even drew the shapes ..as of now we know that kids in early age are curious and use these word, its because of their curiousness about these body parts
And its is so strange that in english its easy to just say these word , but in Hindi these words feel full of shame, crud, uncomfortable (I mean the association to these words).

also the black bird also became the place where I gazed and got lost in the day dreams....it was this black and white writing and wiping of the chalk ..the dust from the chalk and so on the appearing and disappearing of the letters and numbers ..gave something to that mind which was in the stage of development..camapred to the text of a book which is written and can't be rewritten once printed ..it exists..
the things on black board exist and disappear nothing is there to stay, its a very interesting object, to project ur subject .

so now in terms of the piece I even see blck board as a news Chanel, with headlines like BREAKING NEWS,
I can also see it as a text book of a young boy who is drawing naked torso of women !
also the writing from the regions books
and the mere abstract white appearing and become a sort of cloud !
also the blackbords can be used to form structure like a building !
i am just starting to think of the black boards as black boards but also what is there metaphoric value to our piece and how can we explore its use ?

yesterday i saw the movie BLACKBOARDS, the young director from IRAN who made it,
 so i am putting the links below for u to see and make observations.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P8oF6m2DiJg
this is the process of how she made the movie, its interesting to watch and listen..I will recommend to see the movie first
here it is with eng subs
in 8 parts
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6sUxKDDLdaQ&list=PL5mR0PxdNDZ6OF8nLwvWEZXSMaRKEbVe7

project description n idea of set design

discussed by the never ending news and incidents of the sex offences with women and specialy the inhuman crime of gange rapes in indai, i set out to do a research on a dance project to look for the reasons behind this never ending crime.
my idea was to look for reasons and observe the behaviours of men in these male dominent societies, and the reasons were very simple to understnad.and some how we all know why does a rape happens. largly its men to be blamed for these crimes.but wht are the reasons behind their becoming sex criminals. 

so instead of developing a social theaseas on the problem I shoot out to search for movements which could suggest and show these reasons which led to the so called sexually surpressed state of the mind and body.
A big part of this is also my own lived experience, as I am born and grown up in rural india in those cultural setings which are very conservative and talking of sexual need is a tabu, where relegious principals and morals are valued higher then any living being. where the idea of physcological health is still unheard of.
Choosing the movement based approach to this project also have two strong reasosns- one that it was the movement( dance) which give me the way out of the closed world i was part.puting me in touch with my self where i could reflect..so it made sense for me to think in the response to the possiblity of the effect a movemnt has on minds.
second reason for choosing the approach of the movemnt is that there is
a lot of discussion in delhi and banglore and many indian cities about the sex crimens against women..it seems to be that the intelectuals the writers are able to expresse their views and the educated citizens of india are able to understnad the problem but they are failing to reach to the core of the problem which lies with people who are like how i was..before i got aware.. so for me it made sense to not talk to the people but show them the feeling of a teenager who is hiding his sexuality..who is been judged constnatly ..who is experiencing violence in almost all fronts of the life ..to whom
the women in bollywood films and magzines is just a object of desire and lust..who don't know himself and want to become like the projected image
of the commercials, who can't filter information, who is beeing contantly manipulated..who is slowly geting desprate to find an outlet to his provoked sexual desires. who is unsure of his existance, who is peeing through these wholes in the bathroom walls to have abit of flesh of womens body.
he who don't understnad that is about to become the victum of his uncultivated mind.
so I wish to comunicate through the movement which are put in context which rises these situtations and conditions in a simple and abstract way ..so that audience can think and have a possiblity to come to a place of reflection ..
I am not trying to find a solution to this huge problem..but my aim is to work stronly to bring people of all kind mostly men and also women to come to a place where they can relate to the problem in their way and reach to a place of acceptance ..reflection
any change can't happen before each individual of the society can realise and reflect. 

for the research I investigated and read- The male domination- the most problamatic idea in every culture, why all the GODS are male, jesus, Mohamed, Shiva, Budha, and so on..in mnay relegions around the wolrd. the book i read which help me in geting a further information beyond my knowledge of the subject. please see attached document on the degration of women from the book "seven secreets of the Godess"
on the take of the relegion There are many facts which does play a strong role on the psysc of menhood.
But in perticular there is one figure which is very fascinating in indian relegion is Hanuman, who is the symbol of ultimate devotion and who has taken an oath not to have a sexual life, he who posses a lot of powers because of the idea of not mating.
he is also the god who is being prayered most by the wrestlers and teenagers in northern india to surpressed their sexual needs,,which i find very strange in one way he is the ultimate devote becuase he has denied the courtship of women, he becomes the ideal to be followed as in india there is a strong culture to follow the ideals more then seeing who they are.
this aspect is still under worked by any artist or performer in india, so I will work on this aspect of relegious charecter.
as I have known and as we seen the life of indian men is effected strongly by social status, finacial status, relegious mindset, 

every culture sets standereds for its Heros and their Villans, in that way its easy for them to differentiate in good and bad. its very easy to say bad guys do bad dids and look them as criminals, but we don't want to look behind what made them criminals ..the circumstances..the tromas of violence..and abuse..and how does these are very spacific to all the differnet societies. Indian males sexual surpression is a set of problems which are intertwine with the process of mans dominance over women, development of social structure which doesn't permit freedom of expression, relegious teablous
, task of servival, discrimination, which some time are in opposition to the process of natural evolution.
the process-
during the research we did to public events and few open rehearsals in delhi, the first structure we presented in a rural village to the village audience was the one which delt with the degration of women from godess to the meer property of the owner MAN. we also xplored the pyramid structure of the hirachy which is so very present in indian social base, man gods and God, the ultimate Ego or menifestation of the men himself.

in this structure we discoverd who women was related to earth and cultivation of earth land gave rise to the idea of owning, the materialistc preception of the world, and what underlined was the anxiety of men. here we used live music and some recorded music with the text from the book "seven secreets of the godess"
second part was a work for three weeks in a studio in new delhi with seven dancers including myself,where we worked on finding the movements
which delt with the learning by repetation, the masculin men, their sexual provcation, hidden lust, guilt, implosive frustration, verbal absue, dealing with the animal self..the dominance of the sexual animal and thus the gang rape. cime bord becoming the face of the sexual crime, and the acceptance and guilt of being the man who they are.
this was the thoughts behind the movements and the structure of the 27 mins ,
here I have used music from electronic composer Ben Frost,
this structure sugest the inner world of these sexual men with out ever showing the women, their activities theier fears , their tromas and their act guided by lust and frustration.
somehow i see that both structures are capable to be effective waht is missing is a bit more dipper approach. a sense of a place where people can see themselvs in the situation in their private moments when they were stuck in those places when did they fought how did they felt ..and then seeing how horable it is to be a rapist, how easily u can end up on the other side of the humanity..so we have a chance to ralise that we have just replaced the other part compleetly her choices and our idea of love has compleetly beeng lost.
a lot of this problems also have to do with the ideas around masculinity of men and what is consider masculin in different cultures in different times, even the effect of the masculin ideas can be seen in the paintings of God, fashion, street behaviour, 

The Idea set n props for the performance -
I have thought of the blackboard and white chalk ( which we have reference from our school days )
It could be 7 black boards , we can use them separate or make wall by putting them together on top of each other ..to create a sort of background ( which is good sometimes when we are outdoor it gives us a idea of what is front and back in space,
they can also be used as ground where different dancers can stand on these black pieces and have solo's
also with chalk we can write ..refrences to writing of life values we learned which teaches a child how good man be and how a good women should be .
also we can draw abstract forms