The world famous opera of Kerala, Kathakali, is one of the ancient dance forms of Kerala. Once confined to temples alone, Kathakali has a lineage and history of 1500 years; and today this wonderful dance performance, with its elaborate dresses, make up and headgears and with emoting movements of hands and eyes, is staged the world over.
The name Kathakali actually means a dance drama in the local language. The artists perform with most difficult movements to convey the exact meaning as the drama unfolds to the tune of drums, cymbals and lyrics sung by the singer in the background.
The make up of Kathakali is the most tedious process and it takes an artist nearly four hours to dress for the exact characters. A character of a man is portrayed through the colours of the face. Basically male dominated dance form, today even females are venturing in the act.  The dance dramas are based on Hindu mythological stories and the characters are depicted by the colour of the make up they wear.

 While the green face depicts a virtuous man, a green face with red beard depicts an aggressive man or a man with a demon's characters but from a good family, Ravana is often depicted by this makeup. A white beard depicts a Rishi or an ascetic while a black coloured beard depicts a hunter or an aboriginal, tribal man. The women characters also performed by men normally are depicted with lustrous yellow colour on the face.
Earlier the performances were staged overnight from dusk to dawn and enjoyed the patronage of the royalties. Staged with melodious music and drum beats, with the actors emoting every single emotion and trying to convey every message to the audience with various hand and eye movements, in the flickering light of the huge oil lamps, gave these performances an awe of divinity earlier. Today although the divinity is lost, the awe-inspiring effect still lingers on. The only dance performance that comes near to Kathakali is the Chinese opera.

Mohini Attam

Mohini Attam is the dance of the enchantress. While Kathakali was a male dominated art form, Mohini Attam was evolved to counter the male dominance and it is the dance form performed by females only. It is distinctively not a temple dance performance as any other classical dance form of India and is also one of the youngest classical dance performances of India. Vishnu once came to solve the dispute between the gods and demons in the form of Mohini, a beautiful seductive maiden. Hence the name Mohini is attached to the dance, which is Attam in the local language.
Mohini Attam is a dance of sheer enchantment, its purpose being overtly sensual. The dress is simple and not elaborate like the Kathakali, neither too jazzy like the Bharathanatyam but essentially sensuous, with a white gold bordered sari tied in a typical way, with just few gold ornaments and the hair tied in a bun, tilting to the left with a white flowers adorning it. This classical style was born out of a clever fusion of the highly stylized and male-monopolized Kathakali with the rigid Bharathanatyam. Though it shows deep affinities with both these styles, it has developed as a distinct dance-form with its own personality. Like Bharathanatyam, Mohini Attam is primarily intended as a solo dance to be performed by girls only, and its technical structure is quite similar to the former. At the same time, the great influence of Kathakali movements has given it a much greater dramatic, emotional impact.
Although today exponents like Kanak Rele have brought it outside Kerala and gave it its due recognition, this beautiful and sensuous dance performance still remains in the peripheries of Kerala.

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