Unrehearsed (Virtual) Artist Residency Program

Cartoon by Veena Basavarajaiah. The artist uses illustrations to address issues of the art world through the insta profile @cartoon_natyam

Nava has been facilitating the Unrehearsed Artist Residency Program, a virtual program that funds and supports South Asian dance and movement artists from many different backgrounds, genres, and identities. Many of these artists are challenging the status quo, which often prevents us from witnessing certain stories or points of view. The artists self-define what challenging the status quo means to them and then show up with their art in the most beautiful, deep, and personal ways.

A huge thanks to everyone who applied for this years program. We are so excited to announce our 2025 Cohort below! We are grateful for our reviewers for working with us to put together another amazing cohort. Ashwaty Chennat is an interdisciplinary performing artist and program facilitator based in Chicago who was also one our reviewers last year. Sangram Mukhopadhyay is dancer and dance-maker based out of Kolkata and an URP alumni! From Nava Dance Theatre, Nadhi Thekkek and Purna Venugopalan also aided in the review process. URP was co-founded and created by Nadhi Thekkek & Tanu Sreedharan

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Press release

Meet the 2025 Cohort!

Leia Devedason is a writer, composer, and dance-learner from Singapore. She is currently a PhD student in Performance Studies at UC Berkeley, where she researches and writes about queer performance, aesthetics, and artistic labour under capitalism, with a focus on Indian classical dance. In addition to dancing and performing Odissi, she served as a dramaturg for Devotions (2022), a project that combined the storytelling traditions of abhinaya and Western oratorio music. Most recently, she directed and composed her own dance film, Jani: there is nothing empty (2024), created under the Bay Area-based Voices of Bhakti artist fellowship.

Renuka is a fat queer Indian-American multidisciplinary artist, performer, and community organizer born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area. Described as “optimistic” from a young age, her work is fueled by a radical belief in a future rooted in interdependence, love, and rest. Renuka’s creative practice began at age 4 with Bharatanatyam, where she performed both ensemble and solo pieces accompanied by live and pre-recorded music, until she paused to attend college. For six years, she explored other forms of creative expression, including singing, long-form essays, fashion, photography, and most recently, poetry. In 2023, she reintroduced dance into her life by joining Duniya Dance & Drum Company and began exploring her own voice as a choreographer. As an aspiring pleasure activist, she examines how somatic embodiment and radical vulnerability can sustain the difficult work of liberation by invoking connection through healing and joy. She debuted as a solo artist, performing both original writing and choreography, during Novalia Collective’s “this is my body” June 2024 cohort. Her creative process draws on her experiences with community organizing, storytelling, and yoga, as well as her ongoing learning of new dance forms, to craft narratives that challenge herself and her audience to dream of and take action toward a liberated future.

RuAfza is a multidisciplinary artist based in Brooklyn, specializing in drag performance and visual arts. As a low-income immigrant from India, their work explores themes of gender, immigration, and consumption, often utilizing technical forms such as lenticular imagery and immersive installations and shows.

Ammr Vandal began her Kathak training in Lahore, Pakistan, studying under the late Maharaj Ghulam Hussain and Nahid Siddiqui during Zia Ul-Haq’s regime, which banned women from dancing. She was featured in Pakistan's first publicly televised dance performance following the restoration of democracy, performing in Nahid Siddiqui’s piece celebrating Pakistan's independence.
After moving to New York City, Ammr resumed her Kathak training under Parul Shah, a disciple of Kumudini Lakhia. She became a prominent performer with the Parul Shah Dance Company (PSDC), showcasing her artistry in productions such as All That’s in Between, History of Unforgetting, Chasing Upwards, Rushing in My Mind, Precious Cracked Earth, and several traditional Kathak pieces. Beyond group performances, Ammr has also delivered solo shows in Pakistan and New York, gaining recognition for her emotive storytelling and technical precision.
Currently based in New York, Ammr continues to evolve as a choreographer and performer, crafting works that reflect her personal experiences and cultural heritage. Through her artistry, she bridges the traditional and contemporary, bringing Kathak to audiences in ways that resonate with contemporary narratives while honoring the form's rich history.

Pandurang Sagbhor is a contemporary dance artist based in Maharashtra-Goa, India. Finding dance at 19 was his rebellious response to the monotonous education system and regressive social fabric he grew up in. While coming out as a young gay man, dance became his safe space to express himself. He acquired initial dance training in Delhi (2010-2017) while pursuing architecture at the School of Planning and Architecture. Starting with modern jazz, contemporary, and ballroom dance, it became another medium of expression for him and a new lens to examine the socio-political fabric surrounding him.
His interest in contemporary dance started to grow deep in 2017. He was awarded a scholarship by the Inlaks Shivdasani Foundation for Body Space Time residency at GATI Dance Forum, Delhi, in 2017, where he was exposed to the world of movement practice. He was awarded an exchange work-based scholarship for The Body and Performance Residency, Goa, in 2022 and The Play Practise Residency, Bangalore, in 2023. Recently he has been an artist in residency at the 9th edition of Art of Improvisation Residency, Goa, hosted by InContact Collective (November-December 2024).
With holistic research, he believes in mindful body practice to explore body-space politics, gender issues, and imposed social conditioning in Indian and global contexts. He investigates these subjects through the lens of power dynamics, inclusivity, identity, access, and authority.

Joshua Sailo is an anti-disciplinary Mizo artist, allowing his experience as a dancer and choreographer to branch out into various forms of expression through music, illustration, and visual design. His creative practice and research are autobiographical in nature, exploring themes of identity and power while navigating the world through a queer indigenous lens. Embarking on a new multi-media project supported by Foundation of Indian Contemporary Art, he is currently reexamining Mizo “folk” practices to devise new systems of composition, placing emphasis on the body as a living archive for storytelling, music, and dance as a celebration of “togetherness”. He continues to expand his range as a performer, appearing in works by Sasha Waltz and Guests, Foofwa d’Imobilité, Preethi Athreya, and Surjit Nongmeikapam amongst others, and is committed to building new arts audiences across India through teaching, producing, and podcasting.