Brief outline on the planning for the Shakti Dance Academy in Udaipur, Rajasthan.

1. Phase I Plan for the Shakti Academy of Dance, Circus Arts and Energy Healing
A Three Ring Shrine Udaipur,
to the Body Electric Rajasthan,
India
BACKGROUND
Like most modernizing cities in Asia, Udaipur displays widening economic disparities between its haves
and have-nots, its educated and underschooled, its mentally agile and physically gifted. Even artistically
radiant children on the back side of these divides enjoy few options and face increasingly harsh futures.
The Shakti Academy of Dance, Circus Arts and Energy Healing is intended to even the existential
odds for these kids' and incubate new forms of genius that classroom desks can't nurture. In sum, we
hope to create a replicable new school model to enhance the educational/artistic/social opportunities of
local youth aspiring to virtuosity in music, performance arts and energetic modes of healing.
THREE PHASE DEVELOPMENT SCHEDULE
Dance Academy 2012~2015; Energy Healing Center 2013~2015; Circus Arts School 2014~2016
PHASE I - Shakti Dance Academy, an innovative global/local magnet school to foster virtuosity in
scores of local youth each year, some paying tuition, some receiving need-based scholarships. For more
advanced students the school will also offer instructor-led courses and internet-linked collaborative
classes with dance groups around the world as well as other types of training in yoga, choreography,
bodywork and fluidic martial arts.
INITIAL FACILITIES
- An 1800 sq ft tent (with removable sides for public recitals), full dance floor, 30 ft of movable full
length mirrors, large screen video lesson projector, kitchenette/library and composting toilet.
ENVISIONED SCHOOL TENT MINUS DANCE MIRRORS OR ADJOINING LAWN FOR AUDIENCES.
WORKSHOP & COURSE FACULTY
The school will recruit eclectic dance masters from eastern and western traditions, musicians, yoga
adepts, bodyworkers and experts in dance-related martial arts. It will also use the internet and video
projection to link students to distinguished teachers and collaborative groups around the world.
-1-

2. RICHNESS ON THE GROUND
Unlike most modernizing cities, Udaipur still embraces a vibrant traditional talent pool and a rich diversity
of subcultures ranging from tribal villages and gypsy camp fires to Sufi mosques and goddess shrines.
We enjoy warm friendships with virtuosos in these traditions and hope to gratefully exploit their talents.
ARTISTIC GUIDES AND GURUS
Bhanu Bharati - Performance Advisor
Since graduating from India's National School of Drama, Bhanu has studied traditional theater
in Japan, worked extensively with folk drama masters from Rajasthan's Bheel tribe and
directed more than 70 plays. An Udaipur native, he has served as Head of the Rajasthan
University Drama Dept, Director of Delhi's Shri Ram Centre for Art & Culture, and chairman
of Rajasthan Sangeet Natak Akademi. Bhanu brings us a genius for stagecraft and extensive
experience in provoking traditional performers to new levels of innovation and creativity.
Piki Chapell - Artistic Director
Piki's Theater 3.0 creative career stretches from San Francisco's rich art/music scenes and
Burning Man culture to the "cirque nouveau" renaissance of Montreal, Quebec. In Montreal
Piki designed haunting musical interludes for Cirque du Soleil shows, performed in many
Cirque galas & premiers, and served for years as musical director of Circo de Bakuza. He's
sung, DJed, and jammed with music greats around the world, and is currently turning his
imaginative focus to India and Japan.
Asa Kubiak - Choreography Advisor
Asa is a Junior Olympic Gold Medalist, a five-year Cirque du Soleil veteran performer, and an
innovative aerialist and choreographer. After years of training in ballet, swimming, gymnastics,
diving, and music, she toured for four years with Cirque du Soleil's "Quidam" show as a
featured hand-to-hand artist. She has worked globally with her original aerial tissu acts and is
currently performing as an aerialist with her second Cirque du Soleil production, "Corteo." She
will be helping develop the school's dance programs and assist recruitment internationally.
Duncan Wong - Energy Arts Advisor
Now a skilled Kung Fu adept and Astanga Vinyasa yoga master, Duncan has spent the last 30 years
journeying through China, India, Korea and Japan to train with hidden or famed teachers in ancient
martial arts and healing body-mind disciplines. Abstracting the most graceful/powerful techniques
from all these traditions, he's created a flowing holistic exercise ritual he calls Yogic Arts. Duncan
will help us with workshops and guidance to integrate our performance, dance and healing worlds.
Bhargav Mistry - Music/Improvisation Advisor
Partly inspired by his successful career in industrial design, Bhargav turned to classic Indian music
as a basis for new design creativity. He began studying sarod with Ustad Amjad Ali Khan and
soon won a Sur-Nandan Bharati Gold Medal in Calcutta. Having mastered classical techniques,
he took his formidable skills on the road to jam with local virtuosos in Turkey, Korea, Italy, the
US and rural Rajasthan; and has released 7 CDs of his solo and collaborative performances.
Bhargav will help guide our intercultural partnerships, fusion efforts and improvisation classes.
-2-

3. INITIAL SPECIALTIES
Gypsy/ flamenco traditions, Sufi/yogic dance, Tap/Kathak fusion, hip hop/Pung Cholam,
martial/gymnastic choreography and improvisation coaching for classically trained artists.
LOCAL ALLIES
Bharat Verma, an enterprising young Udaipurite from a long line of traditional musicians, has developed an
eclectical and talented group of dancers from among Udaipur's street kids and economically disadvantaged youth.
Their annual recitals have become major cultural events and packed the Town Hall Theater in recent years.
Sayari Sapera, founder of Roots of Gypsy, is an accomplished dancer, singer and choreographer working to
expose and creatively develop the best of Rajasthan's native gypsy traditions. She has performed all over the
world and now runs Udaipur-based gypsy dance classes and a superb performance company.
Rujuta Vaidya has choreographed for many Bollywood films, major events including the Slumdog Millionaire
Oscar performance, and Disney movies for which she auditioned nearly one thousand young Rajasthani dancers.
TARGET STUDENTS
Udaipur harbors many fine schools for the well-to-do and intellectually inclined. However, there are
few if any equivalent resources for the poor who are attracted to sensuous physical arts or even kids
who are better off but dream of creative lives outside the call centers, corporate cubicles and factories.
- Intro courses: auditioned K-to-12 kids from Udaipur area;
- Adept courses: gifted youth and dancers from all across Rajasthan
- Tourist oriented classes: regular dance workshops for foreign and domestic visitors
EDUCATIONAL GOALS
• Open the first non-classical creative dance school in Rajasthan with special focus on at-risk youth.
• Train inventive young artists, instructors, director/choreographers and dance therapists in a
casteless, classless atmosphere.
• Produce enchanting performers who can also improvise, teach and create fresh choreography.
• Use diverse dance traditions to introduce students to other cultures' history, values and artistry.
• Teach aspiring dance professionals cooperative self-management and promotion skills
• Instill awareness and appreciation of one's body, immediate surroundings and natural environment
with meditative practices, site care and maintenance "rituals".
• Enhance recognition of human/Nature interdependence as key to creativity, health and survival
SOCIAL GOALS
• Offer creative artistic career opportunities to economically or educationally at-risk youth
• Support students/grads with booking/performance aid, media portfolios & web-based promotion.
• Develop a self-sustaining dance education model for replication in other heritage cities.
ARTISTIC GOALS
• Develop world-class performers, acts and productions for local and international audiences.
• Foster intercultural collaboration to generate new dance forms and genres of creative performance
• Explore the borders between diverse dance traditions, Eastern energy arts (yoga, Tai Chi, Chi
Gung, etc.), and fluidic martial disciplines (Capoeira, Kalarippayattu...).
-3-

4. DISTANCE LEARNING IN DANCE
International collaborations, choreography and coaching with internet e-dance power
Distance education has taken a quantum leap with the fusion of the internet and video projection power. Now
dancers too can learn and co-create choreography with their peers in any country by linking to live or archived
feeds with their collaborators. With rather simple equipment, the Shakti Academy tent can become a globalized
training space and offer students access to many of the most exciting dance teachers and traditions in the world.
For dramatic examples of the fresh art this tech is birthing, check out the Legion of Extraordinary Dancers.
LOCALE
On the banks of lovely Lake Pichola in Udaipur, Rajasthan, the heart of 5-star heritage culture
Voted World's Best City by international travelers is 2009, Udaipur hosts over 10 million tourists each year,
including one million foreign visitors. Despite this torrent, the city has few creative performance venues and the
average tourist stay is only 1.6 days. The nine 5-star hotels in the neighborhood are constantly searching for local
attractions to prolong their guests' stays and this offers a huge and promising market for talented young performers.
ORGANIZATIONAL ISSUES
The Shakti Academy is currently being planned and developed as a project of Udaipur's Big Medicine Charitable
Trust, a government recognized public benefit NGO. Once launched and underway, the academy will become an
independent Section 25 non-profit corporation, a classification India grants to social entrepreneurial initiatives.
FUNDING
Udaipur's Big Medicine Charitable Trust (BMCT) and Big Medicine, its ancestral non-profit institute in Maine,
USA, are seeking approximately US$120,000 in start-up funds from donors and foundations in India and abroad.
Tax-exempt contributions can be made to their US fiscal sponsor, Center for Ethics in Action.
BMCT is also sponsoring a December 2011 Indian fundraising tour by the award-winning Vanaver Caravan that
will perform at various hotels and festivals in Rajasthan.
The Shakti Dance Academy is projected to be financially self-sustaining after three years of operations based on
revenue from tuition, workshops and performance activity.
CONTACT
Rita Dixit-Kubiak, BMCT Founder Trustee US Tel: 207-423-4141 Email: bmct@greeningindia.net
-4-