New Delhi hosts arteast festival, 2019: ‘Brahmaputra – an imagination’

The National Foundation for India is presenting ‘Arteast Festival’, a three-day festival of photography, art installation, poetry, video installation and music at the Art Gallery of Kamala Devi Complex of India International Centre in New Delhi from Thursday.

The art festival christened ‘Brahmaputra – an imagination’ has been curated by senior journalist Kishalay Bhattacharjee.

The art festival will host a couple of intersections that include ‘Brahmaputra – Explorer Odyssey’ where panelists like Parimal Bhattacharya, associate professor, Department of English, Maulana Azad College, Kolkata, and a bilingual writer, most recently, of ‘Dodopakhider Gaan’ (Ababhash, 2019) and ‘No Path in Darjeeling Is Straight: Memories of a Hill Town’ (Speaking Tiger, 2017); Samrat Choudhury, also known as Samrat X, author and journalist; and Harish Kapadia, distinguished Himalayan mountaineer, author and long-time editor of Himalayan Journal will take part.

The session will be moderated by Kishalay Bhattacharjee.

In another seminar, Dhurbajit Chaliha, a tea planter from Assam will chornicle the river’s tea story and shows how to brew leaves for the perfect cup.

Another interesting inter-section has been christened ‘Imagining a New Commons: Ganga and Brahmaputra’ where panelists Shiv Vishvanathan, social scientist, professor at Jindal Global Law School, Sonipat and director, Centre for the Study of Knowledge Systems, O P Jindal Global University; Uma Dasgupta; Ian Baker; and Claude Arpi.

The session will be moderated by Sumana Roy, poet and author of ‘How I Became a Tree’ (Aleph, 2017) and ‘Missing’ (Aleph, 2018), who writes from Siliguri.

A concert will be presented by Chaar Yaar – Madan Gopal Singh (vocalist & poet); Deepak Castelino (guitar & banjo); Pritam Ghosal (sarod); and Amjad Khan (percussion)

According to the organizers, Chaar Yaar brings to ArtEast a fusion of different genres of music to celebrate the new conversation of syncretism of Brahmaputra and Ganga.

The inauguration will also feature a choreographed dance ensemble ‘1 sq ft’ by Surjit Nongmeikapam, the Manipur based dancer.