Founder, Kalakeli
Navala’s journey is one of devotion — to movement, to artistry, and to transformation. Born in London to parents of Indian and British heritage, she has spent over two decades shaping a unique path as a performer, choreographer, and teacher. Today, as co-founder and artistic director of Kalakeli Movement Arts alongside her husband Micka, and as mother to their daughter Aiyana, she continues to deepen her commitment to sharing movement as a powerful force for healing, connection and change.
For over two decades, Navala has performed, choreographed, and taught across the globe, collaborating with pioneering artists and companies such as Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, Damien Jalet, Akram Khan, Shobana Jeyasingh, Hussein Chalayan, New Movement Collective, Union Dance, and Company Decalage. Her work has captivated prestigious international stages and film sets, while her roles as rehearsal director, choreographic assistant, and mentor have nurtured emerging talent within leading institutions.
After more than ten years of living everywhere and nowhere — traveling the world as a dance artist — Navala longed for a place to root, plant seeds, and begin again. That longing brought her to Goa, India, where she met Micka and began a new chapter of life. In the stillness of the 2020 lockdown, Kalakeli Movement Arts was born — not just as a dance initiative, but as a response to a deeper calling.
Based in the jungle of Goa, Kalakeli now offers international residencies, intensives, and workshops where artists and seekers from all walks of life can reconnect to the wisdom of the body, to each other, and to nature. It is a space where art and life meet — where movement becomes ritual, and personal story becomes collective offering.
Through these experiences — and through the unseen journey of personal growth, challenges, and motherhood — Navala’s mission became clearer: to create a space where movement is more than art, but a vessel for healing, transformation, and inner awakening. Her lived experience taught her that the body holds stories the voice cannot tell — and that movement can release, restore, and reconnect us to something greater.
Teaching Practice — Talking Bodies
Navala’s contemporary movement language is grounded in yoga, martial arts, capoeira, floorwork, and somatic exploration. Her classes emphasise breath, gravity, and flow — inviting each mover to navigate their inner world while attuning to others and the space around them.
Her approach encourages risk-taking, trust, speed, vulnerability, and instinct — guiding participants to move beyond their physical and mental boundaries into a space of presence and transformation. Through imagery, improvisation, and structured exploration, she helps movers tap into their personal movement language, while staying anchored in a collective field of play, intention, and artistry.
Navala continues to shape Kalakeli as a living, breathing movement arts space — one that nurtures transformation, honours the body’s intelligence, and builds bridges between cultures, disciplines, and generations.
