Sesayarts Magazine Article about "Brown People Can't Be Ballerinas"

  8/21/2023      

 



Click for  article by Arpita Ghosal, Sesayarts Magazine (August 22, 2023)

It was a pleasure doing an interview with Arpita Ghosal. As an artist, you can deeply feel when someone connects to your work and understands your struggles. Thank for your beautiful article!


Arpita Ghosal

Arpita was born into an arts-adoring family, and raised with music, dance and theatre, beginning as shared experiences with her family: her violinist grandfather, her singer/actor father and her dancer mother. As a long-time arts journalist, she has worked in radio, TV and print media, speaking with fascinating people in various areas of the performing and literary arts.
After founding the Sesaya music studio in North York, she began Sesayarts Magazine as a way to engage the community more broadly with local arts and artists. In addition to writing, she teaches full-time at the TDSB, and is the mother of 3 creative and outspoken children (5, counting her indulged dogs Scrabble and Apricot). She is an avid reader with insatiable wanderlust and deep curiosity about new arts experiences . . . and is troublingly unfussy about cheese and chocolate. 



The Premiere of "Brown People Can't Be Ballerinas"

  6/29/2023      

 


What if you knew you couldn't be something, but you tried anyways? Like, really tried? This coming of age story is based on the real lived experience of a brown girl who scrambled her way into the professional ballet world. 

In this solo performance, Oshi reveals the untold story of how being Brown in ballet is ultimately a test of fitting in. This conflates the problems of going against her family’s expectations of a Brown girl, and not being able to stand up for herself. She is both victim and perpetrator in her struggle to prove that Brown people can be ballerinas. Her bewildering encounters with racism and the expectations of her Brown body are as wild and unapologetic as New York City itself.

"Brown People Can't Be Ballerinas" MMFF Fringe Play from Oshini Wanigasekera on Vimeo.

Click to open the Program for 
Brown People Can't Be Ballerinas






"What I Meant To Say" (2020) wins Best Short

  2/21/2021      

"What I Meant To Say" screened at the 5th Annual CineFAM Film Festival, founded by Frances-Ann Solomon, which recognizes films by women and non-binary creators of colour. On October 24th, Oshini accepted the award for Best Short and spoke about the challenges and courage that woman of colour have when they say "what they mean to say." 


Film Trailer










Past Works 2009-13

  4/10/2014      



The video below is Choreographic excerpts from 2009-13.

"107 Steps" (2011) was choreographed for 360 Dance, NY Connections Workshop, at New York Theatre Workshop.

"My Darling Deflated" (2013) was choreographed for Balasole Dance Company at The Ailey Citigroup Theatre.

"The Herald" (2010) and "The Other Room" (2009) were performed at the Ailey Citigroup Theatre as a part of Student Choreographic Showcases for The Ailey School.

Please check back for video.



 

"Vivartana" July 2014

  4/10/2014      

Photo from http://www.ladiescollege.lk/

For information about the Brown Girl Project, click here.

"Vivartana" July 2014 performance details:

The two performance venues will be,

1. Ladies College
66 Sir Ernest de Silva Mawatha, Colombo 00700, Sri Lanka,
 www.ladiescollege.lk/‎


2. Hillwood College (Cancelled)

Rajapihilla Mawatha, Kandy 20000, Sri Lanka
www.hillwoodcollege.com/

The Brown Girl Project, "Vivartana" July 2014

  4/10/2014      



 

SUMMARY

As a Sri Lankan Canadian, I had many obstacles to overcome both in finding my identity and pursuing my dream of dancing professionally. In 2011, I began training at the Dance Theatre of Harlem, a leading multi-cultural dance institution that was created to address racial inequalities. My performance and teaching experience with the Dance Theatre of Harlem School inspired me to broaden this vision to people of my own ethnicity, and women globally.
In 2014, I created The Brown Girl Project, an educational outreach program that would premiere in Sri Lanka. The program was designed to open discussion about expanding opportunities for women of colour and inspiring girls to pursue their dreams. The performance, "Vivartana," will premiere July 2014 in Sri Lanka. It will include a classical ballet performance, a dance class, and a multimedia history presentation at no cost to participants or participating schools.

The presentation, complete with videos and graphic animation, reviews the history of Dance Theatre of Harlem from its inception to present success. Along the way, students make connections to significant events and eras such as the slave trade, the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr, and the abolishment of apartheid in South Africa.

For more information about "Vivartana" performance dates click here.





BACKGROUND

Growing up as a Sri Lankan Canadian girl gave me the sense that I could live the American dream but that I shouldn't expect to enjoy the same privileges as my classmates. I was too young to understand racial discrimination, but I did understand that even my gender had already defined my role in society. Reclaiming my identity, free from these barriers, took years. This is the main reason I feel the need to compel young women especially of my ethnicity to be a generation  of confident, independent thinkers, and community leaders.

Sri Lanka is still a developing nation and poverty forces many girls out of school. Lack of education and a sense of autonomy creates women who cannot defend themselves or help to build a strong community. On the economic flip-side, Sri Lankan girls do attend good colleges, but few choose a male-dominated career. Academic success is determined by two levels of critical exams, and the competition is fierce. Girls, who are already guarded from the world, are even more homebound with their textbooks. What does success look like to these young women? Do they have role models in their communities who challenge their idea of success?

Inspiration for The Brown Girl Project came from my dance training at the Dance Theatre of Harlem (DTH). The Dance Theatre of Harlem has always strived to challenge the stereotypes of African-Americans in ballet, while also addressing economic and cultural disparity. Their educational outreach program, Dancing Through Barriers, was created during DTH's historically unprecedented tour to Johannesburg, South Africa in 1992. The program toured to various apartheid-segregated townships with lecture demonstrations and master-classes. DTH founder, Arthur Mitchell, insisted that workshops be free and theatre tickets subsidized to prevent an audience of solely wealthy whites. "Whether you're in Harlem or Europe or South Africa, it's the quality of what you do," Mitchell said. "Truth is correct and will hit everybody." DTH's current Artistic Director, Virginia Johnson, said at the time, "I see it happening all over the world - people are real dubious about black people doing ballet. To see their wonderment, excitement, to know that anyone with an opportunity can do what they want to do. Dance, arts, are things that bring people together."

I found my own experience with performing and teaching in DTH's local outreach programs, and speaking with audiences to be inspiring and rewarding. Children who saw dancers of colour perform and speak about Afro-futurism expressed pride in who they were and they showed a great interest in how the dancers had come to be where they are today. They saw beauty and wanted that for themselves. That is what I want for young people in Sri Lanka.

As an artist, this program has impacted the significance of dance for me. The ability to share this art form is the greatest gift I have to offer, and I look forward to hearing from audiences about what their dreams are.
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