Hello Readers!

We hope you have had a great start to 2020!

India Foundation for the Arts (IFA) is back in the New Year with news on our work between October 2019 and January 2020!

Dive-in for updates on our programmes—Project 560, Arts Research, Arts Practice, Arts Education, Archives and Museums, and for news on our many events—film screenings, lectures, exhibitions, and more! Apart from our regular events, we organised Past Forward: Celebrating Critical Practices, a three day arts festival, bringing together over 40 diverse artistic expressions from across the country. Scroll down to read more about the festival!

We are delighted to present our unique 14-month Limited Edition Calendar for 2020-2021, featuring a select range of IFA projects! Order your copy for Rs 450/- (inclusive of domestic courier charges) online now or write to us at contactus@indiaifa.org before February 15, 2020 and spend the year flipping through the work we support, cutting across disciplines and cultures, covering the length and breadth of the country—from a community art project that explores Bangalore city through the lives and perspectives of the transgender community, a film project that documents the experiences of women police officers of Delhi to a project where school children explore creative movements with a bharatanatyam dancer, and many more! Our calendar will see you through early 2020 and allow you to choose the image and project that captures your interest—with any month of the year. A unique feature of this calendar is that its design enables you to choose the image and project that captures your interest—with most months of the year.

A member of Aravani Arts Collective addressing the audience at Karagadha Kathegalu - Stories about a form, space and people at Ulsoor cemetery, Bangalore in September 2019

Please visit our website or find us on Twitter, facebook, and YouTube. We are also on instagram now. Follow for regular updates!

We hope you enjoy the contents of this newsletter and we would love to hear from you! Write to us at contactus@indiaifa.org with any feedback or query.

Warmly,
The IFA Team

The Project 560 programme at IFA is committed to a long-term, continuous engagement with the city of Bangalore through multipronged strategies including grantmaking and collaborations.

We are delighted to introduce you to our recent grantees under Curated Artistic Engagements and Arts Projects (Research/Practice):

Mahesh S, an artist received a grant for a photography-based exploration of the history, architecture, and cultural memory of the Public Utility building that was opened to citizens in 1973 on MG Road, as the tallest built space in Bangalore. Delving into narratives of nostalgia, dismay, hope, and indifference, the project seeks to investigate into the conception of the building, the impact it has had on the city and imagine its possible futures. The outcomes of the project will be an on-site multimedia exhibition / installation comprising of audio, photographs and sketches, a photo essay and a personal essay.

Gaurav Jain, an editor and journalist received a grant for a photography-based exploration of the phenomenon of ‘Random Amit’ in Bangalore, which reinforces the stereotype of the brash North Indian male who has migrated into the city. Using the mediums of photography and text, propagated in a participatory mode through social media and offline encounters, the project will interrogate the popular, humorous and pejorative nickname Amit. It will explore the subjects’ sense of inhabiting this idea of a monolithic, homogeneous North Indian identity in a fast-changing Bangalore. The outcome of the project will be a photo exhibition.

Visual Art Collective, a charitable trust that is operated from 1Shanthiroad Studio/ Gallery received a grant for a series of curated artistic engagements in Bangalore which will explore the different aspects of the city through the experiences of its various inhabitants. The events will include an art exhibition on the city, a comic zine-making workshop, a contemporary retake on Bangalore picture postcards, a city mapping project, an event of children drawing their favourite trees in the city, a photography project of portraits of the city-dwellers, a walk in a garden with a botanist and a curatorial mentoring for an exhibition of a landscape artist in the city. The outcomes of the project will be art exhibitions, comic books, postcards, maps, drawings, photographic portraits and a guide on trees.

Chanakya Vyas, a playwright, performance maker and educator received a grant for a series of gaming interventions as a theatrical strategy to examine and reimagine the issues related to the urban commons in Bangalore, with a specific focus on lakes, in the face of rapid and brutal development. Using the tools and elements from Live Action Role Playing games (LARP), participatory art, and storytelling, the audience will be invited to take on roles to play the game. The outcome of the project will be this interactive game theatre performance played over ten engagements in the Sarjapur/Bellandur neighbourhoods.

Our grantees, under Neighbourhood Engagements organised a variety of events and activities in and around Bangalore city:

A story walk and workshop mapping memories
Suchitra Deep received a grant in 2019 for a creative workshop that seeks to build a collective identity for the neighbourhood of Malleswaram through the memory mapping technique. On October 20, 2019, Suchitra led a memory mapping workshop in Malleswaram inviting participants to share their memories and experiences in the neighbourhood. Along with collaborators Aliyeh Rizvi and Arzu Mistry, Suchitra led the participants through a story walk, sketching, documenting and sharing memories of the sounds, colours present in the locality which culminated in a workshop creating a set of memory maps of Malleswaram. Click here to know more about the project.

Participants of the story walk through the neighbourhood of Malleswaram in October 2019

Painting the railway wall on Pottery Road
Anaheeta Pinto received a grant in 2019 for an artistic engagement involving the children of Richards Town, Bangalore. Twenty children of the Richards Town – eight who live in Richards Town, six whose parents or grandparents are pourakarmikas (municipal sweepers), and six from Clarence High School along with collaborator Aditya Fernandes, undertook the final painting and translation of children’s sketches on the newly rebuilt railway wall on Pottery Road on November 02, 2019. This project was made possible with support from the larger community in Richards Town including the residents, Pourakarmikas, staff at the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP), Southern Railways, local traffic police, Clarence High School. The event was well received and garnered much interest from passers-by. Click here for an article about the event.

Children painting the railway wall on Pottery Road in November 2019

Aravani Art Project at Kempambudi Park and Ranga Shankara Theatre Festival 2019
Poornima Sukumar received a grant in 2018 for a year long series of curated artistic and cultural engagements in Bangalore that explore the city through the lives and perspectives of the transgender community, which has formed the Aravani Art Project collective. On November 17, 2019, members of the collective organised an informal panel discussion titled Yaarivaru? (‘who are they?’) with members from the transgender community to share stories from their respective professional journeys and how Bangalore as a city has enabled them to dream. Panellists included Purushi, Priyanka, Aishwarya Reddy, Parichaya Gowda and Nakashtra.

On November 05, 2019, members of the collective premiered their production Nava at The Festival of Laughter and Forgetting organised by Ranga Shakara in collaboration with the Sandbox Collective. This play explores the stories of nine urban transwomen through the Navarasas (‘nine rasas’). Through their performance, they unbox, expand, challenge and defy fixed notions of what constitutes the Navarasa, and who can be its nayakis. They bring their bodies, stories, and voices which have been deliberately silenced and wilfully ignored, to reclaim their rightful place – the centre stage.

The Arts Research programme at IFA supports research into the histories and expressions of artistic practices in India. Under this programme, scholars, researchers and practitioners receive support for projects that investigate marginalised or relatively unexplored areas; create spaces for dialogue between theory and practice; offer new readings and frameworks for artistic practices; and use interdisciplinary approaches to break new conceptual ground. At IFA we encourage projects in Indian languages including English, in order to contribute towards discourse-building in multiple language contexts.

We received 397 queries and more than 130 applications in multiple Indian languages as response to the Request for Proposals sent out in April 2019! IFA Staff along with an external evaluation panel conducted the final round of interviews with the shortlisted applicants and made eight grants in total.

We are delighted to introduce you to our recent grantees and their projects:

Prachee Bajania received a grant for the creation of a feature-length film to build a narrative image of the Mughal princess Zeb-un-Nissa, daughter of Aurangzeb, through her poetry, her depiction in Mughal miniatures, the Deccan palace where she lived for some time and the issues around its current state and need for preservation in an increasingly polarised political environment. The film will record alternative accounts of history before they are obliterated forever and situate Zeb-un-Nissa’s poetry in the current environment of neglect, loss, and selective amnesia. The outcome of this project will be the film.

Sarasija Subramanian received a grant for research into the community kitchen and the history of culinary engagements of 1 Shanthiroad, a studio and artists’ space based in Bangalore. By collecting recipes from artists, residents, staff, patrons, and the extended family of the space, and interviewing key figures from its history, the project will frame the kitchen and food as integral to the site and function of the space as a collective. The process will also feature public programming of screenings, lectures, cooking classes, potluck dinners and more, acting as triggers to activate and expand further the research enquiries. The outcome of this project will be a cookbook and an open archive of materials, resources, references and audiovisual documentation compiled during the process of the research.

Rosalyn Dmello received a grant for a study investigating life in a visual artist’s studio. The project will explore how artists approach their work, overcome creative blocks, experience leisure, and source materials while also inquiring into the significant roles played by their assistants. The project seeks to break new ground by constituting an inventive and imaginative form of art criticism drawing on history and memory, archive and experience, and studio and practice, with an emphasis on the multiplicity of artistic practices as a strategy to disrupt the notion of canon. The outcome of this project will be a manuscript for a book.

Pradip Kumar Kar received a grant for a study of inscribed plaques in temples built in West Bengal between 16th and 19th centuries. The project will focus on the names of the artisans on the plaques and trace their social, cultural, religious, and economic histories. The outcome of this project will be an essay and a set of small exhibitions held in four districts of West Bengal.

Milind Champanerkar received a grant for a study that will critically examine the transmuted Loknatya form developed by Dalit writer, playwright, performer and activist Lok-Shaheer Anna Bhau Sathe during the 1940s to the 60s. Tracing the history and evolution of the form, this project will enquire into Loknatya’s legacy, and its strengths and limitations as a tool for political and cultural activism. It will probe into the reasons behind its marginalisation as well as explore the ways in which it inspired many theatre and student movements including other Shaheers after Anna Bhau. The outcome of this project will be a script for a documentary film.

Latika Gupta received a grant for a study on Cham, a Tibetan Buddhist ritual, at the monasteries of Kye in the upper Spiti Valley in Himachal Pradesh, and Diskit in the Nubra Valley in Ladakh. Through a comparative study of the histories, sites, contemporary performances and material culture of the Cham, this project aims to unpack the notions of ‘tradition’ and ‘authenticity’ to understand the making of and the relationships between religious, cultural and political identities. The outcome of this project will be comprehensive photographic documentation and a series of essays on the transformations impacting form and function of the Cham.

Ushmita Sahu received a grant for research on artist-designer Riten Mazumdar’s life and work, aimed at emphasising its significance and exploring areas of undocumented cultural, political and institutional histories between the 1950s and the 1970s. By analysing Mazumdar’s work within its economic and cultural contexts and situating his practice within Nehruvian socialistic aesthetics of the newly-independent nation, this project will attempt to address the lack of scholarship on the history of modern Indian design.

Sebanti Chatterjee and Soumik Mukherjee received a grant for the creation of a film that will look into the lives of four vocal artists in Mizoram and Meghalaya, who are associated with the congregational and other types of choral traditions. Foregrounding ethnicities, gender, sexuality, citizenship, belief, friendship and art, the film will map their personal journeys vis-à-vis the ritualistic and performative elements of faith and the distinct expressivity of their creative processes. The outcome of this project will be a film.

The Arts Research programme for the year 2019-2020 is supported by Titan Company Limited.

The Arts Practice programme supports critical practice in the arts and accepts proposals all year round. It encourages practitioners working across artistic disciplines to question existing notions through their practice.

We are delighted to introduce you to one of our recent grantee and her project:

Priyanka Chhabra, a filmmaker and editor for the creation of a film that will explore the overlapping relationships between memory, place and personal archive. Located in Amritsar and anchored on the life, memories and archive of Charandas Bangia, a refugee of the Partition, the project is a cinematic exploration of ways in which personal history overlaps with the larger political narratives.

Past Forward: Celebrating Critical Practices

Past Forward: Celebrating Critical Practices was the highlight of the period! We are especially grateful to the audiences for their engagement with artists and the projects presented at the festival. Hear our grantees speak about Past Forward: Celebrating Critical Practices and their projects supported under the Arts Practice programme in the Festival Film.

In the past five years, IFA has supported more than 60 projects under its Arts Practice programme. In an attempt to bring together most of our grantees and their projects supported under this programme to our home city, we brought together 40 diverse artistic expressions in a festival through panel discussions, performances, film screenings, workshops and exhibitions, in collaboration with Bangalore International Centre (BIC) over three days from October 30 to November 01, 2019. Watch the Short Film to catch brief glimpses into some of the exciting events at Past Forward: Celebrating Critical Practices. Also find the panel discussions under the six themes of Interrogating Pasts, Confluence of Forms, Engaging Communities, Making Meanings of Myths, Thinking Audiences and Imagining Futures and keynote addresses by Sunil Shanbag titled Artists in Troubled Times: Past Present, and B Jayashree titled Rangabhoomiya Hudukaata (‘In Search of Theatre’), on our YouTube channel now.

We would like to thank our philanthropy partners – Bangalore International Centre, Biocon Limited, C. Krishniah Chetty Group Of Jewellers, Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan, RMZ Foundation, Sandeep and Gitanjali Maini Foundation, and Jaithirth (Jerry) Rao; and outreach partner – Kempegowda International Airport Bengaluru, for supporting this festival.

Contemporary Dance in India Today: A Survey

Contemporary Dance in India Today: A Survey, an extensive report on the contemporary dance ecosystem in India was produced by Annette Leday, a leading choreographer, director trained in France and India, as a commission of the National Dance Center, Paris (Centre National de la Danse) in 2019. This report, originally in French, includes interviews with contemporary dancers from across India. The translation of this document from French to English was commissioned by IFA along with Association Keli-Paris. You can read both the French and the English versions here.

The Arts Education programme titled Kali Kalisu, (‘Learn and Teach’ in Kannada), focusses on integrating arts with the curriculum in government schools in Karnataka. It attempts to achieve this objective through grants made to artists and teachers; and facilitating training workshops for teachers and administrators.

Read about their diverse projects, covering movement and science, history and puppetry, playback theatre and more, which will be carried out in a range of districts across the State:

Krishnamoorthy Narasimha Gaonkar, a theatre practitioner received a grant for a series of arts-based exploratory learning modules at the Government Higher Primary School, Heggar, Ankola in Uttara Kannada district. The project will involve 43 students in various arts integrated activities centred on food recipes of the community. The outcome of this project will be set of radio plays titled Aahaara Samskriti - Idu Namma Oota ('food culture –this is our food').

Jahanara, a teacher received a grant for a series of arts-based exploratory learning modules at the Higher Primary School in Mukta Gudadur, Koppala district. The project will involve sixth to eighth grade students in various craft, literary and folk arts activities to explore and document the quilt making practices of the region. The outcome of the project will be a performance, an exhibition and a publication.

Tharanatha P, a block resource person received a grant for a series of arts-based exploratory learning modules at the Government Higher Primary School, Belandoor, Dakshina Kannada district. The project will enable seventh grade students to explore the ecosystem of a local river – Kumaradhara. Drawing on content from their geography, mathematics, language and science syllabi, students will attempt to learn about the journey of the river, the flora and fauna around it, as well as its importance in the environment of the region. They will be encouraged to respond through their creative expressions. The outcome of this project will be an exhibition and a publication.

Vishwanath E, a visual artist received a grant for a series of arts-based exploratory learning modules at the Government Higher Primary School in Dodda Thimmayyana Palya (DT Palya) village, Tumakuru district. The project will involve sixth and seventh grade students in various literary and visual arts activities in a process of exploring the local history, geography, arts and science associated with the town Madhugiri in Tumakuru district. The outcome of the project will be an exhibition and a publication.

Sunil Kumar AM, a teacher received a grant for a series of arts-based exploratory learning modules at the Higher Primary School in Aletti, Dakshina Kannada district. The project will involve fifth grade students to learn English through various literary and theatre arts processes exploring the local history of freedom struggle against the British colonisers in 1834. The outcome of the project will be a performance, an exhibition and a publication.

Shrikant Navalagiri, a theatre artist received a grant for a series of arts-based exploratory learning modules at the Kasturba Girls Residential School, Kadampur, Bagalkot district. The project will involve sixth to eighth grade students in various visual arts, story-telling, street plays and theatre integrated activities centred on the lives of people from villages submerged during the construction of dams across the river Krishna in the district. The outcome of this project will be a series of performances and radio-plays.

Kala Yatra

This component is designed to enable grantees to share their work with schools and the local communities. Through this, we hope that together, they will develop comprehensive approaches for integrating the arts with the school curricula, strengthening arts instruction and improving the students’ academic performance. This experiential ‘Yatra’ also realises the importance of discovering a new environment and introducing participants to sustainable engagement. To facilitate this, four taluks will host 40 meaningful interactions between grantee teachers and artists and members of visiting schools.

The last such Kala Yatra was held at Humnabad taluk in Bidar district from December 09 to 11, 2019. Gundappa Goudgolu, IFA grantee and art teacher at Government High School, Hallikheda, Humnabad taluk, Bidar district facilitated the Yatra. He was accompanied by six other IFA grantees as resource persons – Baby Biradar, Gururaj L, Mallesha M, Ravichandra D, Shankarappa and Aparna Deshpande. In all, we were able to collaborate with 11 schools and reach out to 46 villages, 95 teachers, 1,366 students and 1,055 families.

National School Grants

We are delighted to announce that the Arts Education programme is expanding! For the first time, we invited proposals from Government aided or non-profit schools across India for projects that seek to integrate the arts into classroom teaching and learning in June 2019. We received 20 proposals from schools across the country, out of which eight proposals were shortlisted for interview. The final round of interviews took place on December 19, 2019 at the IFA Office. IFA Staff along with an external evaluation panel consisting of Nandini Manjrekar, Sriram Iyer and Kaladhar S made the final grants to three schools. Stay tuned for more information in our next newsletter!

The Arts Education programme for the year 2019-2020 is part supported by Citi India.

From 2013 to 2018, IFA ran the Archival and Museum Fellowships initiative. During this period, our work between the years 2015 and 2018 was supported by Tata Trusts. The aim of these fellowships was to energise archives and museums as platforms for dialogue and discourse. It provided practitioners the opportunity to generate new, critical and creative approaches to public engagement with materials in museum and archival collections. These fellowships enabled the creation of multiple narratives and histories, based on resources that would be difficult to access otherwise. During these five years, 35 fellowships were made across fourteen archives and museums. With the initiative having completed five years, as is the practice at IFA with each of our programmes, it was felt necessary to review the initiative and reimagine its future trajectory.

A conference titled Old Routes/New Journeys was organised in New Delhi in March 2018, in collaboration with Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi; and supported by Tata Trusts, Titan Company Limited and Ambedkar University, Delhi. This conference brought most of the IFA fellows, host institutions and outcomes together for the public and experts in the field. This was followed by a programme review by a panel of experts from the field – Rustom Bharucha, Joyoti Roy, Naman Ahuja and Shuddhabrata Sengupta. With the help of their recommendations, the newly articulated programme – the Archives and Museums programme (AMP) has been formulated.

The objective of the Archives and Museums programme, launched in April 2019 for a period of three years, is to continue to energise museums and archives as platforms for dialogue and discourse. Instead of fellowships, the programme will offer grants. The focus will be on both institutions and individuals to become co-producers of knowledge and expertise. The programme will select and work in collaboration with eight institutions – four archives and four museums.

The Archives and Museums programme (AMP) will offer three kinds of grants in association with the chosen institutions – Scholarly Grants, Creative Grants and Technical Grants.

Scholarly Grants: These grants will aim at creating content and supporting the knowledge bank of the institution, culminating into tangible outcomes such as books and catalogues. The grants will be for Rs 4 lakh each, and will cover both research and final outcomes.

Creative Grants: These grants will aim at supporting the creative outcomes of interpreting the collections through exhibitions, films, workshops or other public engagements. The grants will be for Rs 4 lakh each and will cover both research and final outcomes.

Technical Assistance Grants: An additional grant for technical assistance such as building inventories, digitisation, photography, online support, etc will be made in conjunction with the aforementioned Scholarly and Creative grants. This technical assistance will be awarded when it is deemed necessary and essential to the scholarly or creative outcomes. These grants would be made available to the institution or to the technical expert directly. The grants will be up to a maximum of Rs 3 lakh.

Archives and Museums interested in collaborating with IFA on these grants could write to Suman Gopinath at suman@indiaifa.org for more details.

Watch out for ‘Request for Proposals’ that will open soon!

The Archival and Museum Fellowships initiative for the years September 2015 to August 2019 was supported by the Tata Trusts.

The IFA Archive is now online with materials from grants made between 2008 - 2013! The team is currently working on uploading materials from 2007 - 2008 and 2006 - 2005 online.

Explore a grant from the Archive with us!

Discover an Arts Education grant made to educator Mallesha M Pavagada along with the special teacher, Ganapathi Hoblidar, in 2012 – 2013 to create awareness about the social and cultural issues that surround the Government High School, Kalghatgi, Dharwad, Karnataka, and the community, with a particular emphasis on female absenteeism and child marriage.

A street play put up by the students of the Government High School, Kalghatgi. From the grant made to Mallesha M Pavagada and Ganapathi Hoblidar in 2012

The IFA Archive is open every Friday, between 02:30 and 05:30 PM (unless it is a Government holiday). For more information, write to spandana@indiaifa.org

The IFA Archive is built with support from the Lohia Foundation.

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We organise grant showcases that take the form of presentations, performances, panel discussions, film screenings and more, for multiple audiences across the country. These grant showcases help create dialogue and in turn, become exciting spaces of discovery and discussion. Our staff also participated in various seminars to talk about our programmes, projects and the vision of grantmaking and arts philanthropy.

Below is an account of these activities over the last few months:

Film Screenings in New Delhi

Screening of the film Songs of Our Soil by Aditi Maddali was organised on October 17 and October 18, 2019 at Centre of Art and Free Expression (CAFE Jamia) and Studio Safdar in New Delhi respectively. This was followed by a discussion with the filmmaker.

Aditi Maddali received a grant from India Foundation for the Arts, under the Arts Research programme, made possible with support from Titan Company Limited.

From the screening of the film Songs of our Soil by Aditi Maddali at Centre of Art and Free Expression (CAFE Jamia), Delhi in October 2019

Exhibition in Bangalore

CONTINUUM, an exhibition was organised by RMZ Ecoworld from November 09 to 28, 2019 at The Gallery, Bellandur. The exhibit included photographs, video projection, animation projection, gaming projection and film screening by artists including Alakananda Nag, Soumya Sankar Bose, Anitha Balachandran, Dhruv Jani, Avik Mukhopadhayay, Sarbajit Sen, Pallavi Paul, Sahej Rahal and Abul Kalam Azad.

CONTINUUM, an exhibition organised by RMZ Ecoworld at The Gallery, Bellandur in November 2019

Members of our staff travelled to many places to participate in discussions on arts and philanthropy.

Arundhati Ghosh, Executive Director, IFA was invited as Faculty at the Salzburg Global Forum for Cultural Innovators from October 22 to 27, 2019 at Salzburg, Austria. Arundhati facilitated a workshop titled The Art of Asking and also moderated a panel discussion on Arts, Activism, Life: Ways of Cultural Resistance.

Arundhati Ghosh, Executive Director, IFA with participants of the Salzburg Global Forum for Cultural Innovators in November 2019

She was invited to participate in The Age of Cultural Participation: Democratic Roles and Consequences, a seminar organised by Kultura Nova Foundation in collaboration with the Cultural participation network and the Centre for Cultural Policy, University of Leeds and the Danish research network, Aarhus University on November 07 and 08, 2019 at Zagreb, Croatia. At the seminar, Arundhati presented a paper in a panel discussion on Global Perspectives on Democratic Innovation in Cultural Governance.

Arundhati and Sumana Chandrashekar, Programme Lead, participated in a conversation titled Spaces to Places: Art in Public Spaces, What is the role of art in an airport? organised by BIAL on November 31, 2019 at Bangalore International Centre (BIC). Arundhati spoke at a panel titled Idea of a City along with Suresh Jayaram, Naresh Narasimhan and moderated by Susheel Nair. And, Sumana moderated a panel titled Role of Public Art Today along with Abhishek Poddar, Amrita Kamat and Akshat Nauriyal.

Arundhati Ghosh speaking in a panel at Spaces to Places: Art in Public Spaces, What is the role of art in an airport? organised by BIAL at Bangalore International Centre in November 2019

Arundhati participated in a panel discussion on Integrated Arts Pedagogy: Framing Policy and Curriculums for the Future as part of the Arts Education Summit organised by Art 1st Foundation at Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi from December 18 to 20, 2019.

ARTS SERVICES
The Arts Services initiative at IFA enables corporates and organisations to support specific arts projects and experiences that we see value in, and which are close to their hearts. This initiative is not part of our grant programmes, but arises out of our impulse to connect supporters with artists in collaborative projects. It also enables us to raise more resources for our grantmaking.

Teachers' training in Rajasthan

We embarked upon a teachers’ training project in Lunkaransar, Rajasthan, on arts integration in schools, in collaboration with Plan India and the local NGO partner Urmul Sethi Sansthan last year. The second phase of the project, held from November 04 to 09, 2019, included a two day orientation for the local resource persons, followed by a two day training programme for teachers. Our programme staff was accompanied by Aruna BT, an Arts Education grantee as resource person from Karnataka. Teachers shared their experiences of working with students during the first phase, based on which a tentative lesson plan was structured by the programme staff and shared with the teachers.

CATALYST
Catalyst—Arts, An Inspiration for Excellence is an initiative that continues to bring to corporate houses, a wide range of accomplished artists from the worlds of theatre, literature, visual and performing arts, to share their creative journeys and pursuit of excellence in a year-long engagement. These artists include Raghu Rai, Malavika Sarukkai, Aditi Mangaldas, BN Goswamy, Ratna Pathak Shah, Sanjna Kapoor, Romi Khosla, Arundhati Nag, Jitish Kallat, Atul Dodiya, Rahul Ram, Varun Grover, Benjamin Gilani, Astad Deboo, Anju Dodiya, Reena Kallat and Lillete Dubey. Catalyst also includes a version that can be customised to offer arts workshops along with talks.

For more details on Catalyst or if you would like to bring this programme to your company, please write to Joyce Gonsalves at joyce@indiaifa.org

We will be happy to work with you on diverse Arts Services, which include the conceptualisation, design and management of arts courses, talks, and workshops and for different audiences. For more details on the Arts Services provided by IFA please write to menaka@indiaifa.org

SMART (Strategic Management in the Art of Theatre)
SMART, a series of three-day workshop modules to be conducted across India seeks to sharpen the thinking and working processes of theatre groups. It poses questions and possibilities that will push groups to optimise their strengths, overcome constraints and make a significant and positive impact on the internal functioning of the group as well as impact the local theatre ecology.

For more details on SMART by IFA please write to darshana@indiaifa.org

UPCOMING EVENTS
For exciting upcoming events featuring grant showcases across the country, stay tuned! We look forward to seeing you at the following event – do spread the word!

IFA is delighted to invite you to IMPRINT:Riten Mozumdar, an exhibition curated by Chatterjee & Lal and Ushmita Sahu in Mumbai.The show is part of the ongoing research-based curatorial project by Ushmita Sahu, on the life and works of artist-designer Riten Mozumdar (1927-2006). The exhibition is on view till February 29, 2020 at Chatterjee & Lal Museum, Mumbai. The gallery is open between 11:00 AM and 07:00 PM (Closed on Mondays). Click here for the catalogue.

Ushmita Sahu received a grant from India Foundation for the Arts, under the Arts Research programme, with support from Titan Company Limited.

For more details on these events, do sign up for our emails here, follow us on facebook, Twitter or instagram for regular updates, or simply tune into our website at www.indiaifa.org/events

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Arts Practice
Request for Proposals from practitioners
[Open All Year]
For more information, please write to the Programme Officers Sumana Chandrasekhar at sumana@indiaifa.org and John Xaviers at john@indiaifa.org

Experience the Joy of Exploration. Become a Friend of IFA with an Annual Donation of Rs 5,000/- upwards!

Become a Friend of IFA and set out on an exciting journey with IFA with an Annual Donation of Rs 5,000/- through the many worlds of the arts and culture! As a Friend of IFA, you along with 400+ Friends of IFA, will experience the arts and culture through specially curated events, engage in discussions and debates, and enjoy exclusive sessions on the arts and culture! Connect with artists, musicians, dancers, actors, researchers, filmmakers, performers, educators, archivists and fellow art enthusiasts!

As a Friend of IFA, your passionate support will bring to life projects that examine our pasts, enable us to make collective sense of our present, and dream of shared and vibrant futures, together. Your contribution will help projects reach diverse publics—as books, films, performances, educational materials, exhibitions and more!

IFA has been able to facilitate more than 600 arts projects, disbursing Rs 25 crore over two decades across India—because of you. Every donation you make helps us extend support to the field.

To learn more write to menaka@indiaifa.org

To make your contribution online, click here (please do not use special characters ~,!,@,#,$,%,^,&,*,(,),., while filling the form)

To make your contribution by cheque, click here

We look forward to your support.

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Goodies

Set of Six Coasters
Have you picked up your set of six coasters, featuring eye-catching details from select IFA projects over the years? Glimpse at the work that we support during a brief respite as you enjoy your cuppa and go through 2019! From a multimedia artwork tracing the introduction of books to women in India, a graphic narrative documenting the stories of migrant labourers in New Delhi, a film essaying the life and works of artist K Ramanujam, an installation of ceramics exploring aesthetics, a dry plate collodion photography project capturing changes in two villages to an installation in a historic building in Bangalore.

Get your set soon for Rs 550/- (inclusive of domestic courier charges) online or write to us at contactus@indiaifa.org and support our work. Your purchase will go back towards grantmaking.

Have you picked up your set of six coasters, featuring eye-catching details from select IFA projects?

Publications

Painters, Poets, Performers: The Patuas of Bengal
Painters, Poets, Performers: The Patuas of Bengal by Ritu Sethi yet is a visually rich and informative book on the history and evolution of Patachitra—literally, 'painting on cloth'; it provides an outline of this narrative tradition of pictorial storytelling and its multi-talented, polymath makers in Bengal and Odisha.
Please click here to order your copy for Rs 650/- (inclusive of domestic courier charges) now!

This book is supported by Infosys Foundation.

Embroidering Futures: Repurposing the Kantha
In 2012, we published Embroidering Futures: The Repurposing of Kantha, edited by Ritu Sethi. This book traces this journey of kantha from its origins to its current avatar, through the tales and recollections of collectors, inheritors, designers and producers of this unique piece of embroidered cloth. The publication is now available to read online. Click here to read the PDF for free!

This book was supported by Infosys Foundation.

ArtConnect
ArtConnect, a magazine on the arts and culture, is now available to read for free online.

Between 2008 and 2013, IFA published 13 issues of ArtConnect featuring lively, compelling writing and artwork across a host of disciplines and genres, from female impersonators in Company Theatre in Kannada; Marathi Little Magazines; violence in Kannada cinema; gender and the Indian documentary; to the visual culture of early Urdu magazines! Please note that while each issue is priced at Rs 100/-, Volume 7 is Rs 150/- You can avail of special anniversary discounts on Limited Edition collections. All the proceeds from the sale of publications go back into grantmaking!

To know more, write to contactus@indiaifa.org

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IFA: What drew you to the Buguri Community Library project?

Pallavi Chander:The library essentially is a space for children from the community to play and learn from stories and imagination. The first time I stepped into the library, I saw children staring at pictures in books, some reading aloud, some who could not read were making up stories and narrating it to their friends. I could not help but be drawn to their magical worlds. I spent about four months at the library before initiating the Creative Arts Therapy (CAT) program. I was stepping in for the coordinator who was on a break at a residency. It was in that time, that I understood the importance of Buguri in the community and the difference it intends to create in the lives of the children.

The organisation – Harisudala, who largely work with waste pickers were trying to create safe learning spaces for their children; in the hope to provide an alternative where they could work through some of the dire issues and challenges they faced within the community, i.e., alcohol and drug misuse, school dropouts, early/ child marriages, and violence to name a few. The library was already using art-forms such as visual arts, craft work and drama activities in their daily reading programmes. Reading and telling stories by itself seemed to be therapeutic, therefore bringing a therapeutic approach using the arts seemed like a natural progression to their existent programmes. The CAT program also helped to build a safe container for children to therapeutically work through some of these issues mentioned above. Additionally, using the arts for therapy is an up and coming field in India and I am very grateful to the organisation and Lakshmi Karunakaran, the children’s programme coordinator for not only trusting the process but also helping in raising funds for the programme. It is the openness and support from the organisation, the children, and the donors that encouraged me to set-up the CAT programme and it continues to draw me to work at the library.

From a creative arts therapy session for boys at the Buguri Community Library in Banashankari

IFA: Why did you choose to work with adolescent children?

Pallavi Chander: Do you remember that phase in your life when you felt that you are not a child anymore, also not entrusted with all the burdens of being an adult? It is a phase charged with a weird sense of freedom and a rush of social activities; where friends suddenly occupy an important dynamic in shaping your understanding of the world. The body feels different, you notice changes and there is a hurry to do everything under the sun. I remember it as the most confusing and overwhelming phase of my developmental years. I yearned for a space to pause and think through things. I leaned on the arts which allowed me to understand and respond to my world in a way that felt necessary and relevant. It was mostly drama and visual arts that allowed me to create a space, within myself and with my peers, where we could voice our thoughts and emotions. In retrospect, I think I was more idealistic and had the energy to conquer any problem or issue and also acknowledge that we were all probably confused. But somehow it mattered to have that space, it was liberating, irrespective of all that confusion. Looking back, I know it was not easy and I had a difficult time trying to make meaning of things in isolation and the arts gave me some grounding.

When I started working with children, I was naturally drawn to adolescent children because I think somewhere I recognised that resistance, that need to ‘act out’ to ‘be heard’ and although it isn’t pretty to the least, I can empathise with those manifestations. I strongly believe that as adults who engage with young adults, our responses matter as it could impact how young adults adapt to situations, build coping strategies and this is in many ways are the building blocks to adulthood. Young adults are growing up with not just a surge of media influences but seem to find very creative ways of using it. I think we adults need to learn from them and listen to their challenges. Rather than complain about millennials changing culture and simply brush them away with humare zamane pe… (‘in our time’) stories, which I think we do to avoid our own anxieties. Yes, when we were at their age, we did not have as much, but they do and it can be overwhelming to wade through it and blaming them only adds to their challenges. I feel we have much to learn from them and we need to include them in this process.

Participants of the experience sharing session at the Buguri Community Library in Mysuru

IFA: Your programme requires participants to communicate actively with you and with each other. How did you manage to create a safe space for children to share openly?

Pallavi Chander: The CAT programme uses art forms such as drama, movement and visual arts therapeutically to create a safe, confidential and client-led process in a non-confrontational and non-judgemental manner. This translates to a process that is more allowing and playful, establishing required boundaries that is built into the sessions along with the participants. Moreover, the programme is set-up as an open group where the participants come on a voluntary basis, so no one is forced to attend these sessions.

We started the program with trial sessions where we informed the children about these terms and conditions in a way that was accessible to them, i.e., using the language of play and stories. Before we started, I also visited their parents in the community to inform them about the programme and shared a letter of consent in Kannada which the children had to get signed from their parents.

During the programme, it did take a few sessions initially to build these boundaries into our sessions, to create an environment of trust and group rapport among the participants. The therapeutic sessions explored activities such as, using beginnings and closure rituals, improvisations and spontaneity, projective play with materials, stories and enactment, spontaneous play, image work, drawings, movement, and so on, which encouraged the participants to share their thoughts and emotions through the symbols and metaphors of the characters from a story or drawing. This way they shared whatever they felt like, when they felt ready and comfortable and it was at their own pace.

Also, the participants came from the same community where they lived in close proximity to one another, many of them went to the same school and some were even related. In that sense, most of them knew each other and like most relationships, this had its pros and cons in the sessions. However, being together in the sessions also brought them closer and I feel they built strong bonds through the course of the programme.

From the creative arts therapy workshop at the Buguri Community Library in Banashankari

IFA: Tell us about the two books authored by children. How did you come up with this idea? What were the processes involved?

Pallavi Chander: The books are offerings from their experiences of the programme. Aye Reena, authored by the girls was put together towards the end of the programme. One of the recurrent themes that emerged from our sessions was the menstrual rites as all the participants in this group were adolescent girls and a couple of them got their first period during the course of the programme. So we explored this theme by creating a play using materials to enact their experience of the menstrual rites during one of the sessions. In successive sessions, we created scenes using Eric Carle’s style of collage-making from coloured textured paper. Eventually, towards the end of the programme, the girls collectively felt the need to share these scenes as a story with the younger girls and boys so they could understand and be aware of what girls go through during their menstrual cycle. And so, Reena was the character who holds the experiences of the girls and takes us through the journey of her first period as well as the many thoughts and emotions she traverses during these rites and additionally gives some suggestions on how to manage period pain and what kind of cloth or sanitary pads to use in a safe and healthy way.

Similarly with the boys, the book – Oota Aayutha (‘have you eaten your meal’) was the result of participants documenting the recipes of the dishes they cooked. The participants illustrated the process of cooking each dish from procuring the ingredients, calculating the budgets, understanding the procedure, i.e., cutting, kneading or baking (in some recipes), cooking, and finally eating it. As we came to the end of the programme, the participants decided to put these illustrations together to share it with their friends and family and we turned those illustrations into a recipe book!

These books were then given to a designer to digitise, lay out scenes and illustrations into a book format. Finally, with the help of IFA’s Project 560 grant, we managed to print a limited edition of these books. The books are displayed at the Buguri libraries and a few copies have been distributed to other community libraries. We do have a lot of requests for more copies and we hope to raise funds to print them in future.

Recreating scenes of the menstrual ritual on paper

IFA: Tell us about your interactions with parents. Were they open to their kids participating in the experience sharing events you organised, especially when it involved travelling to Mysuru?

Pallavi Chander: The parents were supportive and encouraged their children to attend the programme and some of them even attended the closure event which was held at the library in April, 2019. However, their turn out for the event was rather very low. It would have been good to have all their parents and family members attend the event. Most of them informed us that with both parents working for daily wages through the day, attending such an event would have meant, missing out on a day’s pay, even if it was for an hour and it might have been difficult for them to do so. This is not to say that the parents were not interested but acknowledge the fact that they were working under certain constraints. Also being so close to the elections, the team at the library was informed that many parents were busy attending different campaigns. Consequently, for the next phase, we are planning to have a few sessions with parents. That might help us understand how we can include them into such a process and also open out avenues for conversation about certain topics between parents and children.

The trip to meet the Buguri community in Mysuru was something all the children were really looking forward to and they had informed their parents much in advance. So the parents knew about it and they seemed quite excited for their children. Also, the library has had several events where children have gone for day-trips – i.e., to Freedom Park for the annual summer camp, Cubbon Park for a Sunday session and Rangashankara to watch plays; so parents are quite familiar with the process. However, going to Mysuru was a full-day affair, so there was a lot of planning that the team had to put in place to make it happen and we made all efforts from our end to make sure the parents were kept informed at all times.

The two books authored by children on display

IFA: Many of your sessions were focused on breaking gender stereotypes. How did the children respond to it? Were there any challenges along the way?

Pallavi Chander: Honestly, there were several challenges but that is the work. Talking about gender stereotypes and gendered behaviours we consciously or unconsciously carry due to social training is not an easy area to thread. I had to keep in mind not to hound them with information as the children still had to go back to their environments (home and school) where these stereotypes are celebrated as the norm. Instead, I worked with what they brought into the session, encouraged them to ask questions and be curious about things that made them uncomfortable or bothered them. This way, they were involved in the process of breaking these notions down with me, they came up with questions and arrived at finding some answers. In some sessions, we used symbols and metaphors from stories with puppets and dramatic projections to address these issues. Sometimes we spoke about their experiences and acknowledged their challenges as young teenagers.

Also when the group felt challenged and frustrated with certain issues, as a facilitator and therapist, I was stuck with my privileged upbringing and class politics. I could only wait in the wings till the children arrived at unpacking certain aspects of gendered behaviours and I could only go as far as the group wanted to go. One example was when the boys would casually but violently hit each other in the name of play or when they felt it was okay to tease girls and rag younger boys because they felt a sense of power over them. This was very difficult for me to confront but we managed to address it in a way where the boys were able to talk about it and think through what that idea of ‘power’ was and where it was coming from. On the contrary, there were times when I was pleasantly surprised at how my privilege and knowledge of popular discourse also restricted my view and cushioned me to bracket certain experiences as uncomfortable or challenging. Instead, I found myself questioning certain discourses which have expanded my understanding of certain issues through their experiences. An example is that of the menstrual rituals. Growing up, I completely detested the ritual and blocked it off as something unholy and prejudice. However, when the girls’ spoke of their experiences, my unbiased therapist hat forced me see beyond my experiences and I am grateful for that.

A page from Oota Aayutha? ('Have you eaten your meal?')

Pallavi Chander received a Project 560 grant from India Foundation of the Arts, made possible with support from Citi India.

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India Foundation for the Arts makes grants to artists, scholars, and institutions through the year. For these exciting projects to take shape, we have to continuously raise funds.

We would like to thank our philanthropy partners – Bangalore International Centre, Biocon Limited, C. Krishniah Chetty Group Of Jewellers, Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan, RMZ Foundation, Sandeep and Gitanjali Maini Foundation, and Jaithirth (Jerry) Rao; and outreach partner – Kempegowda International Airport Bengaluru, for supporting Past Forward: Celebrating Critical Practices. We would also like to acknowledge support from Aditya Birla Sunlife Mutual Fund, Ista Event Management & Adinnova, Gallery G, Global Calcium, Star City Cars, S – Soft Solution and Vinar International, towards the festival brochure.

We would like to thank Goethe-Institute for part supporting the Archives and Museums programme.

You can support and engage with IFA in many ways – by becoming a Friend of IFA or a Donor Patron or even by sponsoring our fundraising events and by spreading the word about IFA. Every contribution counts.

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