Earlier Programmes

Theatre Infrastructure Cell (TIC) 

The Theatre Infrastructure Cell (TIC) was set up in 2008 in partnership with the Navajbai Ratan Tata Trust (NRTT) with the overall objective of developing a facilitative environment for the practice of the performing arts in India. Our areas of focus in the pilot year were to support:

• Research to build information, knowledge and capacity
• Project Development
• Advisory Support to organizations that create or enhance performance infrastructure 

A baseline study was conducted to understand the needs and demands of performance infrastructure in ten cities in India. We commissioned case studies and essays that shed light on a range of artists who have negotiated performance spaces in unconventional ways. Many of these studies have been published in a book titled Beyond the Proscenium: Reimagining the Space for Performance. We also undertook a study that explored and documented ‘found spaces’ in Bangalore, to highlight their strengths and weaknesses, and compiled a bibliography of literature on theatre space design. 

We are currently in discussion regarding our plans for the upcoming years.

Arts Collaboration

The Arts Collaboration programme was set up at IFA in 1996, two years after the organisation came into existence. The programme was founded on the assumption that ‘collaboration’ is an entry point into a transformative artistic practice rather than a mere coming together of interested persons with a prior estimate of outcomes. It was felt that when two or more individuals/ groups choose to collaborate, it was often because they desire not only to explore the other’s practice, but also to examine their own through that engagement. Alongside forging new connections between individuals/groups and their specific practices, collaboration would enable disciplinary convergences, breaking new ground for interdisciplinary practices and creativities.

Besides collaborations between and within such established art forms as dance, theatre, music, painting, sculpture, film, literature, architecture, ceramics, print making, textiles, handicrafts, and radio among others, the programme also welcomed collaborations that initiated new forms of practice.

Our objectives in the years following the inception of the programme were to support projects that:

• Developed new work or adaptations
• Allowed for the exchange of training methods and skills
• Extended the reach of the arts
• Developed new techniques or styles of presentation
• Addressed issues that concerned the arts in general
  (support systems for artists or education in the arts)
• Explored new convergences by drawing from other disciplines and practices.

While great many synergies were activated through the programme, it also precipitated a number of problems. Often, to meet the needs of the programme artists would instrumentally force associations with cohorts that did not last the duration of the grant. Some projects were repeatedly delayed, and in a few, one partner ended up bearing full responsibility for the project with the other losing interest mid way.

In recognition of the unweidly aspects of collaboration, and in reponse to an organic shift of priorities at IFA, the organization’s focus shifted from arts collaboration to the development of arts practice. To address this new focus area the Arts Collaboration programme was eventually phased out and replaced by the Extending Arts Practice programme. 

Theatre Development

In 1996, IFA received a grant from The Ford Foundation to establish the Theatre Development Fund (TDF). The purpose of the grant was to enable IFA to take responsibility for the theatre programme that the Ford Foundation had initiated in India in the 1980s. In particular, IFA was expected to provide continuing support for the Theatre Laboratory programme and the Seagull Theatre Quarterly. The TDF was also created to underwrite theatre-related grants under IFA’s own core programmes.

TDF made a total of 13 grants in the nine years of its existence – the programme was phased out in 2005. Seven grants were awarded to organisations that were earlier supported under the Ford Foundation’s theatre program. Three of the grants went to the Koothu-p-Pattarai Trust, one to Rang Vidushak, and three to the Seagull Foundation for the Arts. In addition, four grants were made under IFA’s Arts Research and Documentation programme, and two under the Arts Collaboration programme.

Theatre Laboratory Programme: This programme was conceived to help selected theatre groups become influential centres of theatrical research and creativity in their respective regions. The hope was that the selected groups would eventually become strong and stable institutions able to make a positive impact on theatre development, first in their immediate environment and then more widely in their respective regions.

All round support, covering both administrative and artistic costs, was provided to 11 theatre groups (selected by an advisory panel from among more than 80 groups that applied in response to a Request for Proposals) for three years.

Management Development Programme: IFA worked in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore (IIMB) to design and offer workshops to enable theatre groups to address unresolved questions connected with their organisational culture and style of governance, and begin to manage their activities more professionally.

Institution Development Programme: This programme sought to enable theatre groups to build their institutional capabilities and set in place processes and systems that would allow them to continue their work in a sustainable way. In April 2001, IFA invited theatre groups to apply for institution development grants, which would enable them to put in place appropriate management systems and staff development programs, and seek professional advice in such areas as media relations, audience development and income generation among others that might be relevant to their context.

Theatre Documentation and Publication: Part of the TDF mandate was to help strengthen theatre documentation and publication in India. This goal was addressed mainly by supporting the theatre publication program of the Seagull Foundation for the Arts (Seagull). The organisation was given three grants that variously supported the promotion and publication of the Seagull Theatre Quarterly (STQ) – a journal which gives priority to the voice of theatre practitioners, focusing on their creative processes, theatre practices and oral histories, research towards the publication of theatre reference books and the creation of marketing and fundraising capabilities that would enable the journal to become self-supporting over time.