Dance and Painter Team Up for 'Blue' Performance at Ithaca College

ITHACA, NY—Dancer Ishrat Hoque will perform among paintings by artist Siona Benjamin in a program titled “Color Me Blue” on Tuesday, March 27, at Ithaca College’s Handwerker Gallery. Described as “an exploration of female energy and power,” the lecture/performance will take place at 6:30 p.m. and it is free and open to the public.

 

The program is part of the multimedia Ithaca College series “The Arts of Jewish India: Explorations in Painting, Architecture and Music.” It includes an exhibit of Benjamin’s works, “Blue Like Me,” on display in the Handwerker Gallery through April 7. In her series, Benjamin combines symbols of her Indian homeland and her Jewish heritage with paintings framed in the style of Indian miniatures and expressing the complexity of her American immigrant identity. She will deliver a free public gallery talk about the exhibit at 12:15 p.m. on March 27.

 

Born in Bangladesh, Ishrat Hoque is trained in several forms of Indian classical dance and performs frequently with her dance troupe in the New York City area. Painted blue for the performance, Hoque will reflect the color of the women portrayed in Benjamin’s vivid autobiographical paintings.

 

According to Benjamin, blue expresses “being a Jewish woman of color….Having grown up in a predominantly Hindu and Muslim society, having been educated in Catholic and Zoroastrian schools, being raised Jewish in India and now living in America, I have always had to reflect upon the cultural boundary zones in which I have lived.”

 

“The Arts of Jewish India: Explorations in Painting, Architecture and Music” is cosponsored by the Jewish Studies Program and the Handwerker Gallery, with support from the Departments of Anthropology and Theatre Arts, Schools of Humanities and Sciences and Music and Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs.

 

For more information, contact Jill Goldsmith at (607) 274-1988 or jgoldsmith@ithaca.edu.