Dancer In The Dark

Ballerina pia sutaria has fought injury and apathy for the art she loves most.Now, she’s on a mission to make india love it too.

- Pia Sutaria

I remember walking out of the movie theatre with my mother, at age five, dumbstruck after watching Billy Elliot (2000). It was my introduction to ballet and made me believe you could dare to dream outside the box. Or better yet, that there was no box. Unlike Billy, who had nothing but his own sheer will, my twin sister, Tara, and I had incredibly supportive parents who believed strongly in the power of the arts. We grew up in an atmosphere of song and dance, and regularly accompanied them to concerts and choir rehearsals from a young age. Classical ballet was the first dance form I was exposed to—I felt transported to a realm where the unreal seemed possible.

There is nothing natural or intuitive about ballet. Your body is expected to go against its very nature. The first thing you learn to do is turn your hips and feet outward to create a more pleasing alignment. Then you learn to defy gravity by leaping through the air and pirouetting. Most people, when they learn you do ballet, will say, “Ooh, stand on your toes!” But going ‘en pointe’—balancing the weight of your body on your toes—takes years of training, lots of blisters and perpetually bleeding feet. I understood very early on that choosing this life would also mean choosing to live with constant aches and pains.

I started learning ballet at five, at Tushna Dallas’ The School of Classical Ballet & Western Dance in Mumbai. Mrs Dallas, now 75, is a renowned ballet teacher and the woman who single-handedly shaped my future in dance. With her I studied ballet, modern dance and ballroom. I became convinced that classical ballet would be my future and gave all my Royal Academy of Dance (London) exams through her school. At 16, I was ready to start training professionally. I had no idea what was coming.