10 Year Celebration - Prakriti Dance

Prakriti Dance is celebrating 10 years this year- 2024! It was founded with a mission to transcend cultural boundaries through Indian performing traditions. Over the past 10 years we have focused on development of artists, collaboration, education and creating original work which is relevant to our world today.

Prakriti was co-founded by Kasi Aysola and Madhvi Venkatesh in 2014. The inception of Prakriti began as an exploration to find a unique voice through Indian Classical Arts in the United States while growing as artists ourselves. Our first performance as a company was in 2014 and all these years later we have expanded and worked with so many artists.

We have toured 3 original evening length productions in venues such as Kennedy Center, Jacob's Pillow, Atlas Performing Arts Center, Dance Place DC to name a few. We have also had the privilege to tour in India as well!

Prakriti believes in education as a source of diversity and inclusivity which is heavily reflected in the school work we present. We have been to over 60 schools in the DC Metro area offering educational programming to children on Indian art and culture and even environmental issues such as ocean awareness and recycling. It is an important way to connect with our community and share our unique work and lives.

Over the past few years, we have been teaching dancers and helping them develop into performers. We have presented 3 of our students in their Kuchipudi Rangapravesam and continue to focus on development and fostering a dedicated journey towards dance.

In 2022, we were joined by Archana Raja (Marketing Lead and Artistic Associate) & Madhuvanthi Sundararajan (Programming Lead), who are also dancers in the company, to help build Prakriti's infrastructure. They have been a great addition to the company and we have seen so much growth through their efforts.

This year, we have many upcoming projects and performances which we will be sharing along the way. We are working towards a performance in the Fall to celebrate our 10 year mark. We plan to bring our past, present and future artistic works and members into this performance to celebrate how far we have come. If you donate to our campaign you will supporting the following:

We know many of you have been a part of our journey over the years. We thank you for your kindness and interest in our work. We hope you continue to support us in this campaign. No donation is too small and we are truly grateful to have a community who has helped make our dreams into realities! Thank you!

Sincerely,

Kasi Aysola

Artistic Director

Prakriti Dance

*Stay tuned to this space for more updates on projects we are working on this year!

Banner Photo Credit: Jaime Kraus