Bharata natyam by Meera Sreenarayanan
Saturday, October 24 | 7:30pm
Kathak by Tanveer Alam
Sunday, October 25 | 3:00pm with talkback
Roundhouse Performance Centre
181 Roundhouse Mews, Vancouver
Tickets: $25 General Admission, seniors/students/members $22
Event Link here
This October 2026, in partnership with the Roundhouse, Mandala Arts and Culture Society will be presenting the performances of world renowned bharata natyam dancer Meera Sreenarayanan from India on Saturday, October 24, and Toronto based Kathak dancer Tanveer Alam on Sunday, October 25. Meera is one of the most popular bharata natyam artists of her generation. She has performed to acclaim around the world, and it is the first time that she will present a solo performance in Canada. Tanveer is a young Kathak dancer, who is also a graduate of the Contemporary Dance Arts Institute of Canada (DAI), and who was recently nominated for outstanding performance by an individual at the 2026 Dora Mavor Moore Awards. It is also the first time he will be presented in BC. The dancers will be presenting two of the most popular Indian classical dance forms: bharata natyam / South India and Kathak/ North India. Both artists bring contemporary sensibilities to their presentations and chosen dance forms.
Aside from running an unparalleled bharata natyam teaching program in Vancouver, and reaching out to the community with local presentations, Mandala Arts and Culture has a 25 year history of bringing to Vancouver the performances of some of the the top most Indian Classical dancers. Amongst them: Priyadarshini Govind. Janaki Rangarajan, Meenakshi Srinivasan, Sujata Mohapatra, Lavanya Ananth, Savitha Shastri, Rahul Acharya, Renjith and Vijna, Akaash Odedra, Bhavajan Kumar, Navia Natarajan and Thomas Vo Van Tao.
This will be a weekend of Indian classical dance not to be missed.
For more information about the performance, request for interviews etc. Kindly contact Mandala’s Artistic Director Kiruthika Rathanaswami mandalarts.ca@gmail.com
About Meera
“A performer totally without a consciousness of self or any feelings of wanting to be pretty. She was the dance.” – Senior Critic Leela Venkatarama
Meera Sreenarayanan is a Bharatanatyam practitioner from Guruvayur, Kerala, whose work spans performance, choreography, and pedagogy. Guided by a sustained inquiry into the making of performance, she explores how movement acquires meaning, how emotion is cultivated, and how artistic traditions remain living sources of discovery. She trained under Prakash Choondal, R.L.V. Anand, and Nirmala Nagaraj of Kalakshetra, and continues her studies with Indira Kadambi while pursuing Navarasa Sādhana under G. Venu. She also holds formal training in Kuchipudi and Mohiniyattam. A postgraduate in Bharatanatyam, a diploma-holder in Nṛtyaśāstra, and a Gold Medalist in Physics, she is the Founder-Director of Tatdhii Arts and Learning. Meera has performed extensively across India, the United States, Japan, the United Arab Emirates, and Canada, and is a Doordarshan Graded Artist. Her work has been recognised with honours including the Outstanding Talent Award from Narada Gana Sabha (2025), the Best Performer Award at The Music Academy Festival (2019), and the CCRT Young Talent Scholarship. Alongside her performance career, Meera continues to write on dance, pedagogy, and performance, contributing to contemporary conversations on Indian classical arts.
About Tanveer
Toronto-based Tanveer Alam started his Kathak training with Sudeshna Maulik and continued further nuanced studies with guru Sandhya Desai. Alam is a 2019 graduate of western contemporary dance from Dance Arts Institute of Canada (DAI). Tanveer has received further kathak training from Pandita Shama Bhate and Sanjukta Sinha. He is currently pursuing mentorships with Harikishan S. Nair and Dheerendra Tiwari.
Alam has performed in the works of Rina Singha, Lata Pada, Padmini Chettur, Harikishan S. Nair, Sashar Zarif, Brandy Leary, Lucy Rupert, and Peter Chin, to name a few. As an emerging choreographer, he has presented work at SummerWorks Festival, Battery Dance Festival +, Luminato Festival, and Tangente. As an emerging curator, he has supported programming initiatives with Dancemakers, TOES FOR DANCE, and Flemingdon Park Toronto Public Library. He was the co-curator for the Kathak & Ballet program at Fall For Dance North 2025, a leading international dance festival based in Canada.
Across the 25/26 season, Alam has performed at The New York Kathak Festival (New York), Fall For Dance North (Toronto), the Aga Khan Museum (Toronto), and Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre (Mumbai) to name a few. Recently, he toured Singapore and India as part of Sampradaya Dance Creations’ new work Kintsugi, performed a solo at the prestigious 28th Vasantotsava Kathak Festival presented by Kalashram in New Delhi, India, and was featured as a dancer in the Toronto presentation of Abi Sampa and Rushil Ranjan’s Orchestral Qawwali Project. Tanveer was recently awarded the prestigious Eldred Family Protégé award by the Ontario Arts Foundation, and was nominated for Outstanding Performance by an Individual at the Dora Mavor Moore Awards (2026).
SOCIALS:
Mandala Arts and Culture Society
Facebook @mandalaartsandculturesociety
Instagram @mandalaartsandculture
Youtube @mandalaarts813/videos
mandalarts.ca
Vimeo
Meera Sreenarayanan
Facebook @MeeraSreenarayanan
Instagram @meeraguruvayur
Youtube @meerasreenarayanan
Tanveer Alam
Facebook @tanveeralam.1999
Instagram @tanveeralam
tanveerdance.com
Thank you to our partners and funders: The Roundhouse, City of Vancouver Arts & Culture & BC Gaming.
