Nighat Chaudhry as an Artist and Leader
As a child my home and world was Dance and I left London where I grew up to return to the roots of my being, a Pakistani. My return led me through an amazing journey of self-discovery and of this beautiful land called Pakistan. It taught me about the Sufi’s, our history, our music, our classical and folk dance traditions and the rich cultural heritage that I belonged to.
During this exceptionally grave time of chaos and bloodshed, people have forgotten that Pakistan is a beautiful and vibrant country. The project ‘Aao Mera Watan Dekho’ is an effort to remind ourselves of who we really are – a peace loving and vivacious people with a rich and diverse cultural heritage.
Both Nighat Chaodhry and Wahab Shah are seasoned artists and have performed internationally and across Pakistan. As a local Pakistani performer and an Australian Pakistani, Nighat and Wahab bring their own knowledge of dance and its many flavours to the audience. Here, they travel as friends across Pakistan showcasing its people and the splendour of its heritage.
By using an expressly composed song throughout the video, they unite the many aspects of ethnic Pakistani culture, at the same time celebrating its diversity. The many colourful dances and the artists’ own participation in them will help draw in the viewer, making this a form of infotainment unlike the usual folk music and dance projects. A story line running through the entire project is another connecting string that keeps the pearls together.
Nighat and Wahab are sensitive people and disturbed by the unsettled circumstances of the country. They feel that a gentler and friendlier image must be created so that the beautiful aspects of Pakistan are not forgotten. In the end it is these two artists who make us realize that we have a ‘watan’ to be proud of.
Appeal to contribute for Aao Mera Watan Dekho
I wanted to make a difference to contribute to re-establish the link among our society and our cultural heritage, to establish an awareness of its need for us as a country as a soft image of who we really are and not as we are being projected globally as a land of war and terrorism.
This led me to establish my foundation The Nighat Chaodhry Foundation (NCF). NCF is my vision to establish and re-connect us to our cultural identity, our heritage to establish performing arts as education, documentation and preserve our cultural heritage to prevent the decaying of its presence amongst us as a society.
The aims and objectives of NCF (Nighat Chaodhry foundation) is to encourage, empower and create a transformative space for the youth, the women and all the people of Pakistan, a platform to embrace our cultural heritage and performing arts as a means of human development, as a healing and evolving of our beings and a connection back into the cultural fabric and cultural roots of Pakistan.
It gives me immense pleasure to present the
Nighat Chaodhry Foundation to all the people of Pakistan
and guide them towards a true ownership of our cultural heritage.
Nighat Chaudhry
I was thirsty to experience as much as I could as I soaked in travelling around Pakistan, acting on Television, learning the music and classical dance tradition Kathak and meeting people and artists from different parts of the country. I learnt about culture and traditions of civilizations that had existed upon this soil, visiting historical places of the Mughal era, Taxila and Mohenjodaro that endorsed the evidence of an extremely organized civilization with strong roots in spirituality, music and dance. I decided to live here, to own Pakistan as my land but I started feeling disconnect amongst our society a denial, a refusal of ownership towards our music and classical dance traditions, towards our cultural heritage. I experienced the struggle artists and students were going through in the performing arts with the lack of Performing Art institutions and platforms, lack of research, documentation or preservation for the new generation that was coming into being. What would we have to show in another 50 years from now?
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