| INDIA TODAY - The most widely read newsweekly in South Asia. | INDIA TODAY - The most widely read newsweekly in South Asia. | CURRENT ISSUE MARCH 20, 2006 | | | | YOUR WEEK: ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT |  | | | | FESTIVAL | | Sounds of Holi | | |  | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | NOTES OF THE SEASON: Rashmi Agarwal in tune with Holi | | Holi is a festival of joy, mirth and bucolic buoyancy. Celebrated when both man and nature cast off their winter gloom, it heralds the arrival of spring-the season of hope and new beginnings. And Holi is not just gulal, gujiyas and bhang. Add some music to your celebrations with a rainbow of hori, thumri and folk songs by Rashmi Agarwal, disciple of Savita Devi, followed by folk performances at the India Habitat Centre in Delhi on March 14. Her music combines the emotive and expressive quality of purab-gayaki (style) with the rich and rustic earthiness of folk singing. In the villages, hori, rasiya and chaiti are sung during the month of phagun. These songs are usually in dialects like awadhi, braj, bhojpuri and khari boli. In keeping with the spirit of the season, Music Today has brought out two albums, Holi and Shringar, which contain compositions based on catchy, versatile ragas such as kafi, pilu and manjh khammaj, and feature eminent singers like Girija Devi, Shobha Gurtu, Lakshmi Shankar and Shubha Mudgal. Poetic texts from the vaishnav temples of north India have always inspired musicians. Performed as part of temple ritual or concert repertoire by keerthankars, dhrupad, khayal or thumri singers, these texts have reached devotees and laymen alike. Shubha Mudgal sings Holi compositions in the album Rang Hori, released by Underscore Records, another presentation for the season. And now for some art. A Holi Art Camp is being organised in Delhi by Red Earth, at The Global Arts Village, MG Road, from March 13 to 16, showcasing senior and upcoming visual artists who will create works on the theme. The camp will feature artists like Abhimanue VG, Ashim Ghosh, Bindu Mehra, Binoy Varghese, Brinda Miller, Gogi Saroj Pal, Gurmeet Singh and others. A riot of colours and tones, it is not to be missed. -By S. Sahaya Ranjit |
| | EXHIBITION | | Memorable Cityscapes | | | | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | Works by Anjum Singh (left) and Manisha Parekh | | MUMBAI Anjum Singh and Manisha Parekh will be showcasing their works at Sakshi Gallery. With City in Progress, Singh tries to highlight the changing landscape of a city-the chaos of construction and maintenance. She sees the city as a site with symbols of urban chaos. "It is interesting how for a convenient tomorrow, we have to live in chaos today," says Singh, whose collection comprises five paintings and three installations using plastic tubes, aluminium and acrylic sheets. Parekh, who is known for her minimalist and abstract style, presents 23 works collectively titled Memory Membrane, made from layers of handmade paper of different materials (rice and banana fibre). "The translucent layers have an associative quality. Like we have hidden memories, hidden impressions too can be built over," says Parekh. On view at Sakshi Gallery, Lower Parel, from March 11 to 31. -By Vanita Singh |
| | MUSIC | | Southern Notes | | | MUMBAI Dakshinayan, the two-day Carnatic music festival organised by Banyan Tree Events, features T. Jayasankar (nadaswaram) followed by the violin duo, Ganesh-Kumaresh and Hyderabad Sisters, on March 16. The next day opens with R. Jayanti (veena) followed by a mridangam solo by the stalwart Umayalapuram K. Sivaraman. The grand finale is the vocal recital by K.J. Yesudas, whose renditions are known to brim with bhakti. Soak in. Venue: Nehru Centre, Worli.
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| | FILM REVIEW | | Eye for an Eye | | | | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | CAUGHT: Sunny Deol in a still from the movie | | TEESRI AANKH: THE HIDDEN CAMERA
Director: Harry Baweja
Starring: Sunny Deol, Amisha Patel Teesri Aankh is the kind of film that prompts an existential crisis. After the first few reels of inanity, the audience is forced to ask questions, which have no answers. For instance, why has Harry Baweja taken on the subject of spycams, pornography and exploitation of women when Mohit Suri's Kalyug only recently took us down that sordid path? Why is Sunny Deol, who once took home a best actor National Award, reduced to knitting his brows, flaring his nostrils and squashing villains, cars and motor-bikes with his bare hands? Is Amisha Patel-expressing the anguish of a mute girl who has witnessed a murder by simultaneously widening her eyes and distorting her mouth-a descendent of Asha Parekh? Is London, where most of the action takes place, as lawless as Bihar? Who finances these movies? Who watches them? And the biggest mystery of all: why doesn't Deol get a better hairpiece? -By Anupama Chopra |
| | PAINTING | | Master Returns | | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | A painting by Subramanyan | | DELHI Kalapathi Ganapathi Subramanyan, frequently called simply KG by his contemporaries or Mani saab by his students, is easily the guru of gurus, having taught most leading Indian artists at the art departments of either Shantiniketan or Baroda. This Gandhian artist, who is also a keen writer and thinker on art, is known for his reverse glass paintings that have attracted much critical acclaim and market success. Subramanyan will present his most recent works on polyester sheets, perhaps in keeping with the times. With his consciously calibrated pallette and a Matisse-like quality in figuration, his works are bound to evoke much interest among both artists and buyers. On at Delhi's Art Heritage Gallery from March 10 to April 12. -By S. Kalidas |
| | DANCE | | Season of Duets | | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | Madhavi Mudgal (left) and Alarmel Valli | | DELHI Rarely do two dance forms meet on a common plane where each dancer explores and reaches out to the other. Samanvaya is the coming together of Madhavi Mudgal (Odissi) and Alarmel Valli (Bharatanatyam) after 15 years. "It is not a jugalbundi. It is one composite, harmonic presentation, like two faces of one coin," says Mudgal. Both are sure to set the stage on fire. Be there at Kamani Auditorium on March 17.
-By S. Sahaya Ranjit |
| | WORKSHOP | | Differently Able | | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | | Transcending the physical | | BHUBANESWAR Did Ludwig Van Beethoven's deafness or Christy Brown's cerebral palsy impede their brilliance? Or was their struggle to overcome physiological challenges a catalyst for creativity? Their works would have us believe the latter is true, and the British Council is doing its best to nurture this belief. The Council, in collaboration with Open Learning Systems, Bhubaneswar, is organising a creative writing workshop, Write Right, for disabled persons and teachers of special education. The project began in 2004, when the Council and the Indian Institute of Cerebral Palsy held the first creative writing workshop, conducted by Kaite O' Reilly and Jamie Beddard from the UK. Both have excelled in theatre, media and fiction, besides being powerful role models for people with disabilities. This year's workshop will include talks and activities on disability and discussion of delineation of characters. It will, via abstract paintings, newspaper clippings and theatre, explore the psychological behaviour of children with disabilities and culminate in a performance of skits written by the participants. At the Red Cross Bhavan, Bhubaneswar, from March 21 to 23. -By Swagata Sen
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