Bengaluru-based Linear Festivals and the Prestige Centre for Performing Arts (PCPA) is celebrating their collaboration with Mezok, a play. Not solely will this present be Mezok’s premiere within the metropolis, however additionally it is the inaugural present of the LinearX PCPA performances.
Mezok is a multi-narrative efficiency that unveils the complexities of human nature. According to Jyoti Dogra, playwright and director, “Mezok is a made up name, of a made up mountain, a mountain that sees you before you see it.”
Mumbai-based Jyoti Dogra who has 20 years of solo and unique work to her credit score, says Mezok is the primary time she is writing, directing and producing an ensemble piece. Talking in regards to the ideation and conceptualisation of this work, she says, “It began with explorations around a table, and from there we began building a world suspended between the real and the abstract.”
“Over the years I’ve been working with various pieces of furniture and somehow, I was fascinated by the table. It is three dimensional, but when you look at it vertically, it transforms into something completely different as opposed to when one accesses it from underneath. The kind of spaces a table opens up, just in terms of our presence inside it fascinated me, and I decided to work on this idea.”
A scene from Mezok
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement
Jyoti and some like-minded others developed the concept additional at Nirdigantha, the artwork schooling centre at Shettihalli,over a interval of two months.
“We started with a table and no plans, but within the first 20 days, ideas began to emerge — of a mountain, offices, dining tables and bureaucracy. Soon, the table stopped being a table — it became a bar, a home, a plough, a field, and more. Our material began to develop and I started to structure it; that is how the piece came about.”
“An upside down table is a space that is different from the one that is created when you stand up on it. You are in a different place altogether, and not just physically,” she provides.
Though this weekend will see Mezok debut in Bengaluru, it has already accomplished 20 exhibits after opening In Bombay and has been staged in Bareilly, Hyderabad and Delhi.
As many as six regional languages will be heard in Mezok — Kannada, Hindi, Punjabi, Sirmauri (a Pahari dialect from Himachal), Garhwali from Uttarakhand, and Ladakhi, aside from English — courtesy actors from Ladakh, Jaipur, Bengaluru, Delhi and Mumbai.
“From the beginning, I urged actors to improvise in their mother tongue, even though the rest of us would not understand. Language played an important role in the way their bodies responded to the table and the spaces within it,” says Jyoti.
A scene from Mezok
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement
Jyoti elaborates on how a mom tongue causes a shift in the way in which an individual is current of their our bodies and the way these adjustments play out after they relate to different folks. “While most of these actors now live and work in urban communities, the process was a journey back to their roots and childhood and where their families are from.”
“Though the table starts off as an object you can identify with, it has a contextual use and changing its position opens up spaces which changes how you feel within your own body,” she says, including that, ”the desk is just not a prop, however is among the actors, taking part in many roles in Mezok.”
Linear Festivals was based by Vishruti Bindal and Bharavi in September 2024, with the intent of “pushing boundaries and expanding possibilities in the performing arts”. Mezok is their first present in Bengaluru and one of many extra pragmatic features of the festivals is that their occasions are held at venues alongside metro stations to make them accessible for all.
Mezok by Linear Festivals can be carried out on the Prestige Centre for Performing Arts on May 10, at 7pm. Tickets beginning at ₹299 can be found on BookMyShow.
Published – May 08, 2025 09:47 pm IST
