Brought up in Jorhat, Assam, Shilpika Bordoloi’s initiation to dance started very early. At the age of three, she began her training in the Indian Classical dance form of Manipuri under Guru Rathindra Sinha and later on with Padmashree Darshana Jhaveri. Then she went on to study Bharatanatyam under Padmashree Leela Samson, and later worked in her company, Spandan from 2003-2004. Gradually, she went into the world of Martial Arts and is trained in Chi-Gong, Martial Arts (Chinese and Korean) including Tai-Ji-Quan under Sensei Rashid Ansari along with Voice and Theatre Movement.
She holds a master’s degree in English Literature from Lady Shri Ram College for Women, New Delhi.
She has spent considerable amount of time, travelling along the river Brahmaputra and researching on her multi-media project called “Katha Yatra”. A culmination of this project was creation of the physical theatre piece “Majuli” which has been showcased across Assam, rest of India, UK and HongKong from 2014 onwards.
She is a visiting faculty to National School of Drama (NSD), NSD (Theatre-in-Education Wing) and School of Film and Television (SIFT). She is also actively involved in yoga and is a certified yoga teacher providing workshops to people of different backgrounds.
Shilpika has received India’s most prestigious National Young Artist Award. She has been conferred the Sangeet Natak Akademy Ustad Bismillah Khan Yuva Puraskar in 2015 for contemporary/experimental dance. She is the founder member of Brahmaputra Cultural Foundation and has created a Centre of cultural exchanges called NOI at Jorhat, Assam.
She is the playwright, lead performer and director of A Human Endeavour, a play which has also been showcased by the National School of Drama as part of its Bharat Rang Mahotsav 2020.
– Tim Cornwell, Scotsman, 14th August 2017.
In 2020, she performed in Daughter’s Opera in Delhi. In 2013 she performed “Majuli” in Guwahati as part of the “Katha Yatra” project. Others included performances in “Women poets of the sub-continent” in Mumbai and “Longing”, Mumbai.
She has choreographed-“Hum Hi Aapne Aap”, directed by Bipin Kumar (Repertory company, NSD), in July 2012.
She has been a Guest faculty at the National School of Drama (NSD), New Delhi since June 2012. She has been teaching at the School of Film and Television, SIFT, Haryana since Feb 2013 and the Physical Theatre at Bharatendu Natya Academi (BNA), Lucknow, since 2011
I am a Dancer. I believe that we learn by practice. whether it means to learn to dance by practicing dancing or to learn to live by practicing living, the principles are the same. In each it is the performance of the dedicated precise set of arts, physical or intellectual, from which comes shape of achievement, a sense of one's being, a satisfaction of spirit. One becomes on some area an athlete of God.
— Martha Graham