Tag: medha kulkarni

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Event

Saints and poets at NCPA

Two must-watch events happen in Mumbai today, both at NCPA, and both based on the lives and works of saint-poets.
by Medha Kulkarni

You know what’s so great about some Wednesdays? That you have the choice to attend one of two excellent events. Today is one such Wednesday.

Two great events will take place today in the NCPA premises. The first is a film that will screen at the Dance Theatre Godrej, NCPA, while the other is a talk and poetry session about the lives of Marathi saints and poets, followed by a play by Anahita Uberoi.

Scribbles On Akka, Dance Theatre Godrej, 4 pm

India has a long tradition of strong, fearless female poets who have used their art to push into the mainstream consciousness, with issues they deemed important. Unfortunately, our education system is such that most of us have never heard of them or had the opportunity to even get acquainted with their work.

In this scenario, it becomes important to support the people who work to get society acquainted with them, while we learn of our own wonderful literary heritage. The film Scribbles On Akka is one such effort – directed by filmmaker Madhushree Datta, the film is based on the life and work of the 12th Century Kannada saint-poet Mahadevi Akka, a strong personality who wrote radical poems using the female body as a metaphor. These works have been composed and given a visual form against the backdrop of a contemporary musical narrative. The film is a celebration of rebellion, the meaning of femininity and a legacy that’s over nine centuries old.

Mahadevi left the domestic arena in search of God and abandoned all the norms that society imposes, including that of clothing. The film tries to articulate the meaning of this denial through the work of artists, writers and people who have kept Mahadevi’s image alive and dynamic, whether through folklore or art.

The film screening is free but admission is limited and on a first-come-first-serve basis. Do reach early as NCPA has a strict punctuality policy.

Poetry reading and play, Theatre – Sunken Garden, 5.30 pm

It is known fact that India is home to a rich literary heritage that is centuries old. Each State in the country boasts of several saint-poets who have created stunning works in their quest for God.

A celebration of this very legacy is planned tomorrow evening at the NCPA, through a talk and poetry reading session centred around the works of Marathi saint-poets. Renowned poet Prabodh Parikh will introduce the work of several Marathi saint-poets with a specific reference to Dilip Chitre’s translations of the works of sant Tukaram.

This reading will be followed by an interesting play directed by Anahita Uberoi, in which a group of Mumbai theatre actors will read the English translations of poetry by Tukaram.

(Picture courtesy tedxgateway.com)

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Learn

The afterlife of images

Rahaab Allana will give a talk today on the context and meaning of photographs in the absence of their creators.
by Medha Kulkarni

The Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum, famed for its education programmes and talks for the public, is organising a lecture on ‘The Afterlife of Images’ by Rahaab Allana (in featured image above), curator of the Alkazi Foundation, today.

Exhibitions of photography have been understood in terms of the imperial, modern and post-colonial, and hence have been part of a collective enterprise, representing the complexities between past and present. Even the photographer’s subjectivity is questioned, together with the camera’s ‘framing’ of time: its ability to reveal, censor, alter and re-orient.

But how are these understood when dealing with images whose authors no longer exist? Allana aims to look at archives and its afterlife, where this depth of field haunts the photographs that have no living author. These photographs are often viewed as timeless: a world in which the temporal, spatial and historical form ephemeral links and express the fraught relationship between the personal, self-conscious and the aesthetic. Photography to this extent signifies a complex system: art-practice, visual mode, a process, a tool and hence, an absorbing, malleable means of representation. Allana’s talk will be a reflection through exhibitions curated and assisted by the Alkazi Foundation.

Rahaab Allana is Curator of the Alkazi Foundation for the Arts, New Delhi, where he has curated and co-curated exhibitions with essays over the last four years. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society in London.

If you want to attend the talk, do RSVP via email to ccardoza@bdlmuseum.org as seating is limited. Entry is free.

(Featured image courtesy thehindu.com)  

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Listen

Where music comes to the people

National Streets for Performing Arts (NSPA), after entertaining commuters on Western Railway, wants to spread the cheer at other Mumbai spots.
by Medha Kulkarni

June 27, 2012 was an interesting day at Churchgate station. In the midst of this busy railway station, a group of musicians assembled for their first-ever performance. It was a small performance involving two buskers, Jishnu Guha from UK and Sureshji, an Uttarachali folk singer, (both talented vocalists) and within minutes, a crowd had gathered to hear them.

This group was the National Streets for Performing Arts (NSPA) at work. The NSPA was born last year out of the idea to take the performing arts to the people by reclaiming public spaces for street performances. By its own admission, the NSPA seeks to champion public spaces as an alternative platform for performance, encouraging greater interaction between artists and the community, creating spaces of cultural interaction and energising the very city and its people. It aims to support the livelihoods of less privileged and independent performers across diverse genres.

A big factor in starting the NSPA? “To rekindle an atmosphere of street performances in urban India (starting with Mumbai) that aims to bring some joy to the lives of millions as they go about their daily commute,” says founder Ajit Dayal,52, best known as the founder of Equitymaster, Personal FN and Quantum Mutual Fund, when asked about the inspiration behind this unique initiative. Recalling his childhood days of watching street performers in Mumbai city and noting how street performers continue to brighten the lives of residents of cities like London and Paris, Ajit says he wanted to “recreate that in an organised fashion in Mumbai.”

 

Following their debut performance at Churchgate station, the NSPA launched full time performances on October 8, 2012, with music performances at Churchgate station on Mondays, Borivli station on Wednesdays and Bandra station on Fridays from 9 am to 11am and 5 pm to 8 pm. NSPA chooses its locations with care, ensuring that the site would be frequented by large numbers of people but in a spot that doesn’t cause any trouble or inconvenience to commuters.

With a small team of eight members, each a passionate lover of art and performance, NSPA manages to pull off successful events each time and the response from the general public only acts as good encouragement. “The response has been encouraging, proving to both us and the artists that the city of Mumbai is receptive and open to an initiative such as this. We hope to continue the performances at the railway stations and soon expand to parks, gardens and bandstands in the city and across the country, thus weaving art into the very fabric of the city and making performances as regular an occurrence as the trains , the buses and the commuters,” says Shrishti Iyer, Performance Co-ordinator at NSPA.

Apart from the regular performances at Western Railway stations, the NSPA has been collaborating with major art festivals in the city like the Indikaleido Festival, Kala Ghoda Arts Festival, the BMW-Guggenheim Lab etc.

Encouraged by their initial success, the NSPA is now seeking to expand to Central railway Stations, Horniman Circle Gardens and bandstands across the city, apart from other public spaces.

If you want to keep track of their performance so you can catch the next one, all you have to do is ‘like’ their Facebook page at www.facebook.com/nspa.streets for regular updates and notifications.

Categories
Watch

Those ‘others’…

Watch this film if you’re interested in transgender issues; the film is about Urmi, a transgender living in Mumbai city.
by Medha Kulkarni

Today, a film on transgenders will air at the New Marine Lines-based Alliance Francaise, an educational organisation with a non-profit cultural goal. Titled Urmi, the film is a 2010 film by Jehangir Jani and it tells the story of Urmi, the protagonist, a transgendered person living in Mumbai. Urmi roams the city of Mumbai and the film chronicles her search for love and meaningful relationships within the context of a quest for a self-identity. It is an interesting perspective on a city that most of us call home and yet, because of gender dynamics in the city, we rarely get to see.

The film was a TISS-UAGC funded project (Tata Institute of Social Sciences-Urban Aspirations in Global Cities) and is a part of their massive campaign to spread awareness about and to sensitise people to gender issues and dispel myths and the resulting social evils that are born out of ignorance.

Pallav Patankar (in pic on left), director of the HIV program at the Humsafar Trust, is also the actor in the film. “The aim of this film is to highlight the issues that members of the transgendered community face in daily life. It aims to show the ups and downs in their lives and thus help mainstream society understand them” he says.

The film promises to be an interesting one and the panel discussion which will be chaired by Chitra Palekar (film director and LGBT supporter), Jehangir Jani (artist whose work revolves around gender and sexuality issues) and Pallav Patankar, and will throw up some interesting perspectives. The event is free and open to all. Seating is on first-come-first-serve basis.

The Humsafar trust, was set up in 1994, is the first openly gay community-based organisation to be allotted space in a municipal building. It seeks to provide the gay community (and increasingly the entire LGBT community) in Mumbai and India with various facilities to provide the community with the knowledge and resources they require and also works to dispel the prejudice that society has towards this segment of people.

Head to the Alliance Francaise Auditorium, 40, Theosophy Hall, Vithaldas Thackersey Marg, New Marine Lines, Churchgate, Mumbai. The film starts at 6:30 pm.

(Pictures courtesy deccanchronicle.com, mumbaiboss.com. Featured image is a file picture used for representational purpose only and is not a still from the film)

Categories
Event

Waxing poetic over coffee

Poetry Tuesdays moves out of Thane into Santacruz for its fourth event today. If poetry is your thing, be there.
by Medha Kulkarni

Mumbai is an exciting city with lots of wonderful cultural events on offer. Unfortunately most of these happenings are confined to South Mumbai or Bandra, but a casual conversation between two friends over a cup of coffee a little over two years ago sparked the beginning of an event that would slowly change this state of affairs.

Anish Vyavhare and Ashish Amin, poetry and literature enthusiasts, noticed that most poetry-centric events that happen in the city take place only in south Mumbai, and seem to be aimed only at professional writers, poets, copy writers etc. They decided that this needs to be changed and that is how ‘Poetry Tuesdays’ was born.

The first event was held over two years ago in Thane. Not limited to language or word limit, the event is open to everyone and is absolutely free. The aim of Poetry Tuesdays is to provide people with a place to meet like-minded people and to give amateurs a platform to share their work and more importantly, to encourage people to keep alive a dying art.

Till recently, Poetry Tuesday sessions were organised only in Thane, but today, April 9, marks the fourth session at Santa Cruz. The location for the sessions keeps changing (keep track of their FB page for updates) as they meet at different cafés or restaurants. This eliminates the need for a permanent space and keeps the event free.

Ashish says that this also adds an element of spontaneity to their sessions. “Often, other patrons at the café get interested in what we’re doing and join us and surprise with impromptu poetry. Our poetry sessions are always fun and it’s a great way to make friends over a cup of coffee and a shared interest.”

“We want to ensure that every part of Mumbai has a Poetry Tuesday event and hopefully, in the future we can invite talents from across the country to make our events more exciting,” says Ashish, speaking of their future plans.

Ashish’s rules for today’s event

“A Colour Couplet is a two-line poem that involves the use of a colour in it. Not a big thing to do! Take a colour, interpret it or just write a couplet on it.

A couplet is two lines of poem. It may or may not rhyme.

That is it! At the end of all of us reading our couplets, we make it into a single grand poem!

You may write in any language. And as always, the theme is not compulsory. You can write on anything you wish, in any language – English, Marathi, Hindi, Gujarati, Telugu, Kashmiri, Urdu, French, Zulu, Tagalog, whichever!

It is not a competition and there are no judges.”

If you’re interested in participating or simply listening to good poetry, head to Ola Vakola near Vakola Police Station tomorrow by 7:30 pm. Call Ashish on 9920416997 for details or check their FB page at https://www.facebook.com/groups/PoetrySantacruz

Categories
Do

This Bulb has some bright ideas

Blue Bulb acquaints you with fun, sometimes OTT things to do. If you’re a Mumbaikar, you can de-stress with them.
by Medha Kulkarni

“Malls, cafes and bars. Meh. What else is there to do in Mumbai on weekends?”

An oft-heard lament of most of the regular office-going crowd who are too busy to do anything during the week, weekends become repetitive after a while. Joining structured classes, say for dance or art etc. is out of the question for mumbaikers, as work hours are long and erratic. This is precisely the problem that the founders of Blue Bulb saw and sought to fix it.

This is precisely the gap that Blue Bulb seeks to fill. Started in 2011 by Mumbai-based Regan Rodricks, Blue Bulb is a company that offers people in the city a plethora of things to do. They organise sessions for everything from hula hooping to Parkour to pottery and beyond. Most of these sessions are spread over a weekend, lasting from a few hours to an entire day, depending on the activity, and are designed to be taster or introductory sessions that give you the chance to try something new. Blue Bulb organises special activities for children and even has packages for couples. The best part about it? They’re all totally affordable!

“We look out for people doing interesting things and then try to see if more people would be interested in doing something like this. For example, I was introduced to a professional fire breather at a party. We got talking and before I knew it, I was on the terrace with fuel in my mouth about to breathe fire. And that’s how the Fire Breathing Experience became part of Blue Bulb. We also get contacted by instructors wanting to be part of Blue Bulb. But every experience and instructor is first tried by us to ensure quality. Our experience partners are individual instructors, clubs and professional performers who do this activity for a living,” Regan explains.

With over 50+ activities on at the moment (excluding a dozen-odd that they have as one-offs, such as the Hula hoop workshop) what is the most popular activity offered? “One of the most interesting experiences is the 1 Day Paragliding Training. We take absolute beginners, people who have never seen a paraglider before, and by 3 pm, they are flying on their own at 800 feet!” Regan says.

However, sometimes it can get difficult dealing with demanding customers. He recollects a parent who wanted to enrol their 10-year-old child for fire spinning. “We politely refused,” says he. “We get the most outrageous demands from parents, especially in the summer vacations. “

Priced in an affordable range, the rates vary depending on the activity. “But as a rule, we say ‘How much would you spend on a Saturday evening?’ and try to keep the price in that range. Ordinarily, a movie, popcorn and dinner would set you back by Rs 1,500/-. But most of our experiences cost less than that. And honestly, you will forget what you ordered for dinner a month ago. But you won’t forget the day you made your first clay pot or learnt to drive a bullock cart.”

For kids, they have a number of interesting sports like rock climbing, archery, and golf, and experiences like the cupcake workshop, doughnut baker experience, pottery, etc. One of Blue Bulb’s new experiences is the Pilot Simulator, where kids learn to fly a jet plane in an actual plane simulator. The simulator is a stationary cockpit which pilots use for training.

Each session is conducted by a trained professional and the team at Blue Bulb is very thorough and ensures that your experience lacks nothing. What I liked best about the way Blue Bulb organises these sessions is that they are never overbooked. Despite the steadily increasing demand, Blue bulb continues to retain its ‘First come, first serve’ policy and stick to their cutoff. This is good because a limited number of people per class means more personalised attention from the instructor and puts lesser pressure on resources.

Book an activity or experience with Blue Bulb here.

(Pictures courtesy Blue Bulb)

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