This year has been the only time, ever since I have started performing, when I have had no live concerts or performances for eight months at a stretch. I share this experience with thousands of artists across the world.
Initially, COVID-19 seemed like a small storm that would pass in a couple of months. Little did we know that it was a giant tsunami that would take over our lives and render us absolutely helpless. If this was nature’s way of asking us to slow down, it seemed more like a slamming of the brakes.
Everything stopped in the performing arts world. Concerts and events were called off, venues were shut down, and projects were cancelled. Meanwhile, the harshest and most visible effect of the lockdown was on the thousands of migrant labourers left stranded and unsupported, by both the companies and the government. Many artists responded to this and joined volunteer groups in relief work. Also affected were thousands of folk artists and artisans across India.
Along with this crisis of existence, there were also questions of performance and aesthetics that we had to find answers to. How does this pandemic change the way performances are done? Who is our audience in a hybrid-performative world? Has the perspective of the audience changed? Is low-key/home production the new normal? Are gadgets now going to take the centre stage in the making of a performance? Will the world be the same ever again for us, who depend so heavily on the gathering of hundreds of people in one space? How do we use or embrace the digital world? How does one now make a living in this altered performing world? We are yet to find clear answers to these questions as the year draws to a close.
There were some good things that came out of this gloomy period. There was an effort to reach out, across cities and across countries. An effort to talk, exchange, and collaborate. Extraordinary content was made available online. Theatres such as the National Theatre, Royal Court, and Royal Shakespeare Company put some of their best plays online. Iconic performing artists such as Chick Corea and Zakir Hussain held lessons online. Museums across the world curated online viewing experiences. Many kinds of expensive software and tools were made available for free or at low prices for troubled artists. Experiments that explored new ways of expressing and performing were tried out. Here in India, musicians did online concerts, theatres did online festivals, lockdown films were made with limited resources, and music was created across borders with online collaboration.
With the news of a vaccine across the globe, life is trickling back into the veins of the performing world. But the questions remain. What do we make of this altered world? What the pandemic did was to lay bare all the flaws of our society. In this country, it seems like our lack of concern for each other cost more lives than the virus itself.
For now, the immediate concerns are to get back to ‘normal’. The questions that will follow need to be attended to seriously. Sociologically and aesthetically, what do we now define as normal?
(M.D. Pallavi is a singer and theatre, television and film actor)
