Confluence

A meeting of two water bodies, a vision of churning foam, silt leaching into the pristine blue, a clash of wills or a harmonious dance, a burgeoning of excess, unity. Either, both. Oddly enough, Wednesdays performance by Akram Khan and Nitin Sawhney was more a damp squib than the Confluence it was billed as, and a global bid at work an eddying mass of opinions and thoughts instead. Art and life, yet again overlapping as is its wont.

The opening piece was inspired, a seamless, fascinating dance creating maya, a hand linking with another, their own or the others, whose arm, whose leg unclear, but coherent as one, a creature of two parts but still a single creature. Exquisite and riveting. Unfortunately, that was the highlight, with a fair amount of pretension creeping in, that the crowd lapped up, an amusing piece about immigration that had neither dance nor music, but honest and resonating, a compelling set of kathak spins by Akram Khan but otherwise an indifferent show.

Unlike the call which inspired slammed desks, exasperated sighs, ferocious jabbing of the mute button, voices changing cadence, thoughts surging and ebbing, a constant drone in the background, obstructive, creative, tedious, helpless, frustrated.... an urgent second offline call harmonious, productive and calming. Those boys should've taken notes.