Aruna Mohanty (born April 4, 1960) is an Odissi dancer, choreographer and guru. She is currently the Secretary of the Orissa (Odisha) Dance Academy. She has received a number of awards for her work, including the Padmashree award.

Training

Aruna Mohanty started her training in Odissi under Shrinath Rout and Gobinda Pal. In 1972 she started training under

Gangadhar Pradhan Gangadhar Pradhan (10 July 1948 – 10 October 2010) was an Indian Odissi dancer. Life and career Pradhan was born in Parikula, a village in Puri district, Odisha. He was a sickly baby; his father, Muralidhar Pradhan, a farmer, and mother, Dwi ...

. She has also received guidance in the dance form from

Pankaj Charan Das Guru Pankaj Charan Das (1919-2003) was an Indian classical dancer, choreographer and the ''Ādi Guru'' of Odissi dance. He is known as the 'Father of Odissi dance'. Life He was the adopted son of a ''mahari'' (temple dancer) Ratna Prabha De ...

Kelucharan Mohapatra Kelucharan Mohapatra (8 January 1926 – 7 April 2004) was a legendary Indian classical dancer, guru, and exponent of Odissi dance, who is credited with the revival and popularizing of this classical dance form in the 20th century. He is ...

, Sanjukta Panigrahi and

Sonal Mansingh Sonal Mansingh (born 30 April 1944) is an Indian classical dancer and Guru Bharatanatyam and Odissi dancing style. She has been nominated by the President of India to become a Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha. She is the youngest recipient of ...

. She has also received training in Odissi music from Nirmal Mohanty and Shantanu Das.

Career

Aruna Mohanty has nearly five decades of experience as a dancer and choreographer. Her choreographed works include ''Srushti O Pralay'' depicting the super cyclone that hit Odisha in 1999, ''Sravana Kumar, Kharavela, Jatra Baramasi, Gatha Odissi, Pratinayak, Krishna Sharanam,'' several Ashtapadis from Jayadeva's ''

Gita Govinda The ''Gita Govinda'' ( sa, गीत गोविन्दम्; ) is a work composed by the 12th-century Hindu poet, Jayadeva. It describes the relationship between Krishna, Radha and ''gopis'' (female cow herders) of Vrindavan. The ''Gita ...

'', and'' Siddhartha'' based on the novel of the same name by the German novelist

Hermann Hesse Hermann Karl Hesse (; 2 July 1877 – 9 August 1962) was a German-Swiss poet, novelist, and painter. His best-known works include ''Demian'', '' Steppenwolf'', '' Siddhartha'', and ''The Glass Bead Game'', each of which explores an individual's ...

. She has used her art to examine contemporary and social issues; for example. in ''Naari'', gender stereotypes and the status of women in society are explored through the lives and stories of several women in Indian literature and history, such as

Sita Sita (; ) also called as Janaki and Vaidehi is a Hindu goddess and the female protagonist of the Hindu epic, ''Ramayana''. She is the consort of Rama, the avatar of the god Vishnu, and is regarded as a form of Vishnu's consort, Lakshmi. She ...

, Draupadi, Mandodari and

Nirbhaya The 2012 Delhi gang rape and murder, commonly known as the Nirbhaya case, involved a rape and fatal assault that occurred on 16 December 2012 in Munirka, a neighbourhood in South West Delhi. The incident took place when Jyoti Singh, a 22-yea ...

. She has conducted research on dance, focusing on topics such as the representation of the male dancer in classical sculpture and the evolution of Odissi in the post-Independence era. She has been a visiting scholar at several universities in the United States of America, such as the

University of California The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Franci ...

, University of South Carolina and

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...

Awards

* Padmashree, Government of India, 2016-17 *State Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, Government of Odisha, 2014 *Central Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, Government of India, 2010 *Sanjukta Panigrahi Memorial National Award, 2001 *Mahari Award, Guru Pankaj Charan Research Foundation, 1997 *Bharat Bhavan Award, conferred on the recipient by the President of India *Jagannath Sanskruti Bikash Parishad Award

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mohanty, Aruna 1960 births Living people Indian women choreographers Odissi exponents Recipients of the Padma Shri in arts Recipients of the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award