The Profile project asked us to choose someone that we felt made a meaningful contribution to the community. I chose to profile Ashwini Srivatsan, a dancer based in the Bay Area. She practices Bharatnatyam, an ancient Indian dance form.
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This project asked us to create a six page magazine article with InDesign. A lot of thought went into this magazine, we were asked to incorporate graphic design elements and even create our own font! During the documentary project, I got some exposure to InDesign so I entered this project feeling pretty confident. While the documentary project had made me familiar with the basics of InDesign, I wasn’t prepared for the attention to detail that this project would require. Personally, I found the intricacies of this project to be the most challenging. Choosing a color scheme that communicated the right mood, designing a unique font that revealed something about our profile star, selecting photographs that were aesthetically pleasing..none of it was easy. If I had the opportunity, I think I would’ve taken more photos. While I was happy with the photos I had, having a couple extra options to choose from never hurts. As all of my projects at Freestyle, this magazine article was a little stressful but extremely rewarding.
Ashwini Srivatsan is the star of my profile project. She has been trained in Bharatanatyam. She taught dance at University of New Mexico before starting her own company, Tattva, in 2008. In 2012, Ashwini founded Kanha School of Dance, a company that specializes in Bharatanatyam. She hopes to someday make Kanha her full time job.
Nikita Pasumarthi has been a student of Ashwini’s for 3 years. Nikita completed her Arangetram (a two hour solo performance that signifies a dancer’s mastery of Bharatanatyam) under Ashwini’s training.
Srivats Srivatsan is Ashwini’s husband. He also had a brief teaching stint at University of New Mexico though he did not specialize in dance.