Who brought Indian dance to Austria and Vienna long before the word bollywood was known? Before World War II there was a show of Uday Shankar and his group at the Wiener Konzerthaus but before and after that hardly anything is known. With the foundation of the Austro-Indian Association on 17th June 1963 things changed and a few dance performances with great artists have been organised. With the regular Bharatanatyam classes held by Radha Anjali at the Sportsinstitute of the University of Vienna since 1981 and the foundation of Natya Mandir on 3rd December 1983 even more things changed.
But let us look back to the year 1976 when the beautiful and captivating Indian dancer Kama Dev came to Vienna and performed here with his beautiful partner Urvashi and everybody was spellbound. It was for the first time that a classical Bharatanatyam dance repertoire and dances from the styles Kuchipudi and Seraikella Chhau were performed on stage with proper explanations before each item. Moreover it was possible to join a workshop held by the dancers. Several times they visited Vienna to perform and give workshops. A large group of interested young dancers, actors and people from different fields came to learn from Kama Dev. From 1976 till 1981 Kama Dev established regular classes at the „Dramatisches Zentrum Wien“ and it was possible to learn Bharatanatyam, Kuchipudi and Seraikella Chhau in Vienna. After 1981 he went further to Italy, Germany, Netherlands, France where he was spreading his beautiful art of dance. He kept visiting Vienna once in a while for a show and a workshop. Meanwhile Radha Anjali one of his students took up the challange and she continued what he had started. A successful tour of the Kama Dev Indian Dance Company with a group of musicians from Madras lead by Guru Adyar K. Lakshman and K. Rama Rao followed to Italy and Austria. In 1987 Kama Dev and Radha Anjali gave their final duett performance in Vienna at the International school not being aware that this would be their last show together. Kama Dev performed later on in Paris with the production Ramayana together with Pradeep Kar his Chhau dance partner. This is when his health began to suffer and when the exhausting performances in Paris were over he settled down in London to live a quiet life with family of his sister. He unexpectedly passed away on 22nd September 1992.
Shocked and broken hearted Radha Anjali stayed back with a big box of his letters, brochures, photographs, music recordings, dance notations, masks and costumes. She founded the Kama Dev archives and precious moments of his life are kept for the present and future. Remembering the great Indian poet Kalidasa that out of grief and compassion the creativity emerges she started to work even more for the classical Indian dance in Vienna and many successful dance productions followed. After Kama Dev she danced with several indian dance partners. With her senior students she founded the Natya Mandir Dance Company. Together they gave many successful performances in Austria and abroad. Kama Dev left us too early but his style, his elegance and his dedication remains an inspiration to us.
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