Vikram Iyengar
Vikram Iyengar is a dancer, choreographer, theatre director, performing arts researcher, writer, curator, and arts manager based in Calcutta, India, and working internationally. He is co-founder and artistic director of Ranan Performance Collective and initiator of The Pickle Factory – a hub for dance and movement practice and discourse. His scope of work spans practice, discourse, critique and management in the field of the performing arts.
Noted for the bringing together of classical dance, movement, drama and design creating an experience of total theatre, Vikram’s range of production work in India and abroad has brought together dancers, actors and others, and spans choreography for stage and film, dance and theatre explorations, and performance collaborations. Vikram’s international credits include choreographer for Academy Award winner Florian Gallenberger’s film, Shadows in Time and co-choreographer on Helena Waldmann’s Faust prize nominated piece Made in Bangladesh. Since 2013, he has worked regularly with Indian contemporary dancer-choreographer Preethi Athreya on solo and group projects.
An INLAKS scholar with an MA in Performing Arts from the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, Vikram has taught Asian and Intercultural Theatre at BA and MA levels in the UK.He was co-editor of the India Theatre Forum’s web theatre journal, e-Rang from 2009 to 2015. He has been a guest lecturer regularly at both Jadavpur and Presidency Universities, Calcutta.
An ARThink South Asia Arts Management Fellow, 2013-2014, Vikram is a Global Fellow of the International Society for the Performing Arts (ISPA) 2017 and 2019, and a member of Creative Tracks, an international platform connecting arts entrepreneurs. He was one of the five Asia Pacific delegates in the Australia Arts Council’s International Arts Leaders Programme, 2017-2018. In December 2015, he was awarded the Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Puraskar for the field of contemporary dance by the national Sangeet Natak Akademi.
Curatorial Statement:
The Pickle Factory is a hub for the practice, presentation and discourse of dance and movement-based performance in Calcutta, housed in spaces re-purposed for the arts. We are inspired by and constantly revisit the question of what it means to create, share and reflect on such work in a shifting and uniquely Indian context, while being closely connected to an international network of similar endeavours. We actively work with, for and through artists, audiences and support systems towards a vibrant, invested, and critical culture and community.
We Curate Catalyse Cultivate
• Provide regular performance opportunities for practitioners to experiment with
and expand their body of work
• Offer residencies, workshops and training involving local, national and international
practitioners evolving a diversity of perspectives
• Create and implement stimulating arts engagement programmes to develop
interested and sensitive audiences
The Pickle Factory responds to the absence of spaces for discourse and development for dance in India, spaces where practitioners can explore their practice, share and exchange ideas and values, and interact with current and potential audiences, embracing and cutting across the many frictions of form, style, aesthetics and politics that now divide rather than strengthen us.