Lubna Marium

Lubna Marium was a huge part of The Ocean Dance Festival in 2019 which was organised by Nrityajog under World Dance Alliance – Asia Pacific, which had participants from fifteen countries. She is the Vice President for South Asia for the World Dance Alliance and a part of the Global Executive Board. Nrityajog itself has a board consisting of seven people with almost 500 members from all over Bangladesh. Before this event, they also held a choreography residency which was organised by a Canadian-Iranian dancer, Sashar Zarif, in Cox’s Bazaar. With nineteen dancers from the younger generation from India, Hong Kong and Bangladesh, the event was a major success. So, she aims to have an Ocean Dance Centre to facilitate more dance workshops. When asked about the program, she said, “We hope to make it an annual event, but we may not be able to do so for the first few years as there is a lack of funding. This year, we received a lot of publicity and support from the media. We had dancers from all over Bangladesh and the environment was very joyful. World Dance Alliance not only focuses on dance performances, but also on dance writing, reading and research, which are equally important. Their work can be categorised into four types: the creational presentations that we see on stage, research and documentation, training, and support. We have plans to organise workshops all throughout the year and inspire more people to focus on dance studies.” She also added, “We need government’s support, but we may have failed to make them understand what we were aiming for. If we can make it happen, the government will surely come to our support. Moreover, as these are focused around Cox’s Bazaar; the events also serve as a form of cultural tourism. We also want to focus on the minorities, such as Santal, Rakhine etc and work with them.” She also shared her views on the dance industry, saying, “Countries all over the world organise events throughout the year. We have yet to achieve that. We need more solo performances to give students a chance to learn this art form properly. We need dance activists and leaders.”