FESTIVAL CATALOGUE 2019 6 Founder Patron, Serendipity Arts Foundation Sunil Kant Munjal Without the arts, our race would have been photographyand visual arts to showcase their just another species on earth and not a efforts via a multi-disciplinary platform; thus civilization. Throughout history, the arts have allowing the diverse creative expressions of our shaped civilizations, developed societies, culture to seamlessly fit into one frame. empowered minds and inspired the sciences. Across millennia, the arts have adapted to Through 300+ events across eight days, the the surrounding environment and become an festival brings the established and the emerging, inseparable part of our legacy and being. the artisan and the designer, and the classical with the contemporary into the city of Panjim. At the Serendipity Arts Festival, we salute and In the fourth edition, experimental performing celebrate the arts. We take pride in promoting spaces ranged from tents to temporary theatre the cultural heritage that has shaped India’s spaces to disused buildings layered with civilization and given it roots for over five technology and fine arts. The festival enveloped thousand years. This people’s festival brings the city, and arts became a part of the daily diet. the magic of the arts back into daily lives and conversations and provides a collaborative Even as the Serendipity Arts Festival aims to platform that allows voices in the region to create a space that allows experimentation create, innovate and express. and appreciation in the arts, the Serendipity Arts Foundation, which organises the festival, The overwhelming audience response has also supports and facilitates artistic practices encouraged us to scale and become better through the year with projects like residencies, with each passing year, and the fourth edition workshops, grants and educational initiatives was our biggest. The festival showcased the around the country and globally. region’s cultural heritage and featured rigorous programming across Panjimthat included We urge everyone to join us as we celebrate the symposia and workshops with experts from colours of life, appreciate our cultural diversity overseas. Toincrease impact and deepen and re-discover our shared roots, even as we purpose, the festival was made truly inclusive; provide a nourishing environment for the young besides free entry, care was taken to make it in the region to express themselves creatively. accessible to the differently-abled through ramp- access, sign language specialists, usageof braille, etc. Each of our five human senses possess their own charm, yet their true impact is felt only when they are perceived together. A similar approach has been taken while putting together this Festival’s programme. Since inception, an attempt has been made to break away from genre-defining silos and to promote interdisciplinary practices and multi-disciplinary platforms passed on to us by our predecessors. The Festival welcomes art, art practices and individuals from the worlds of music, dance and theatre, culinary arts, crafts, 7 8 Serendipity Arts Foundation & Festival Director Smriti Rajgarhia What is Serendipity? It is a passion project of the team to be able to start something which is larger than each of us. We call it an experiment because we work with so many unknowns and yet try to negotiate spaces where collaborations can thrive. Many a times this experiment doesn’t work, but we believe that if we persevere we will innovate and establish better processes. I would like to thank all our artists, curators and everyone from each team that made us laugh through difficult times and hugged us when we needed it. The curators from all our previous editions, I thank you on behalf of my team and the institution for believing in us. It is a labor of love for collaborations, between and beyond—like-minded people, our curators, the artists and everyone who works Our intention is always to look forward and to relentlessly to put together this Festival. make the festival a better place in each edition. We embarked on this journey four years Wellbeing of everyone is of utmost importance ago hoping to bring people together, voices for us and we hope that you enjoyed this edition together and later, the city with the arts. Today even with its hiccups and tribulations. I must I stand here full of pride for the team that has confess when things got tough and we felt weak, worked relentlessly and stood by the institution the arts held us together. I cannot thank my team we call Serendipity Arts Foundation. For us for the unbending grit and love they have shown the Foundation stands for respect, integrity and continue to show towards the arts and one and humility. I would also like to say that another. The festival is them and they are the even though we seem like a large institution, festival for me. Also a big thank you to all our we are very young team. To further our own supporters and the kind words that came our investigations we embarked on a discussion way. This contribution was possible only because around the idea of creative placemaking of collective effort and each of the audience and what does layering the urban with the members that came to experience the festival. arts mean, what is really public and how the dialectical relationship between art and I would especially like to thank our patrons and the complexities of a city be defined. These sponsors, Havells, HDFC Ergo and TATA AIG discussions held during the fourth edition of for supporting us, all the patrons who have lent the festival will, I hope, give us insights on us their experience and helped us grow—and how to contextually alter the programming to most of all Goa, the Government of Goa and respond and react, and maybe become a case the people of Goa who have made this public study for the region. initiative possible and appreciated. 9 Serendipity Arts Serendipity Arts Foundation is an arts and Foundation cultural development foundation which aims to promote new cultural partnerships, creative strategies and artistic interventions which are responsive to the social and cultural milieu. Committed to innovation, the Foundation intends to support, promote and create platforms for creativity, providing the wider public with a unique source of modern contemporary art and culture. The Foundation’s programmes are designed and initiated through innovative collaborations with partners across a multitude of fields. Each intervention is created using the arts as a means to impact education, social initiatives and community development programmes, while exploring interdisciplinarity between the arts to better understand the shared histories of the subcontinent. Serendipity Arts Festival is the largest platform of outreach for the Foundation. Serendipity Arts Festival is a multidisciplinary Festival Festival that brings together performative, visual, and culinary practices from India and beyond. Spread across various venues in Panaji, Goa, the Festival serves as a platform for eminent and emerging artists to showcase their work and collaborate. Since it began in 2016, the Festival has accumulated a rich database of creative energies and partnerships. As an eight-day long event, the festival is a platform for multidisciplinary collaboration and cultural innovation, and in three years, has grown in leaps and bounds, not only in the scale and number of projects, but also in expanding its cultural collaborations. In 2018, SAF a new panel of curators engaged with a variety of ideas, as well as building on themes from previous editions, including art with a focus on the South Asian region, being addressed through our visual arts, photography as well as craft discipline. Serendipity Arts Festival strongly believes there is something for everyone at this Festival, and were happy to welcome a wide spectrum of audiences over the eight-day event held in December in Goa. 10 11 CURATORS 12 MUSIC The Music programme explores the gamut of traditions in India, as well as their sources of inspiration. The stage is set for Bollywood at its best, jazz, fusion collaborations and crosscurrents of sound. The Festival has unique sound experiences that showcase the affinity between sound, visuals, space and technology. ANEESH PRADHAN One of India’s leading tabla players, Aneesh Pradhan is a disciple of the maestro Nikhil Ghosh from whom he inherited a varied repertoire. Aneesh is the recipient of awards such as the Aditya Birla Kala Kiran Award (2000), the Natyadarpan Award for ‘Best Background Score’ (1998), the Vasantotsav Award (2012), and the Saath Sangat Kalakar Award (2013). He is also a frequent participant in cross-cultural musical collaborations both in the capacity of performer and composer. He has been awarded the Indian Council for Cultural Relations Chair in Indian Studies at the Sir Zelman Cowen School of Music, Monash University. He is also the Director of Underscore Records Pvt. Ltd which he established with vocalist Shubha Mudgal. He co-curates an CURATORS international music festival ‘Baajaa Gaajaa: Music from 21st Century India’. SNEHA KHANWALKAR Sneha Khanwalkar has played a significant role in changing perceptions of Hindi film music by digitally mixing disparate noises, sounds of local instruments and voices to produce a track. Thriving on taking the composition of music beyond the studio, Sneha conceptualised and hosted the MTV mini-series ‘Sound Trippin’. Some of her key projects include Gangs of Wasseypur, Khoobsurat, Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!, Love Sex aur Dhoka in her repertoire. She won Filmfare’s R.D Burman Award for the best music director for the film Love Sex aur Dhoka (2011) and was nominated in the Best Music Director category at the 58th Filmfare Awards for Gangs of Wasseypur Part 1 & Part 2. She has composed the music for the acclaimed film, Manto (2018). 13 DANCE The curation of the Dance programme attempts to engage as many forms of contemporary and traditional Indian dance as possible, including folk.