Price Re. 1/- Volume XXXIII No. 2 March – April 2019 Titled Anthropocene and ArtEast 2019 the River, her photographs FESTIVAL on the river’s seasonal cycle, landscapes and ARTEAST FESTIVAL 2019 people was an intimate COLLABORATION: National Foundation for storytelling. India; The Sasakawa Peace Foundation; The centrepiece of the and New Imaginations, Jindal School of gallery, A Sense of the Journalism and Communication Flow: Brahmaputra and 14 to 16 March 2019 Ganga, was an installation by amateur artist Ashima Curated by Kishalay Bhattacharjee, ArtEast 2019 was an Sharma who conceived exploration into the source, history and imagination of the artwork using dreams, the Brahmaputra. The festival was a visual and historical cartography and material Installation at the festival journey from the river’s source at Mansarovar in Tibet, to memory, imagining a Siang in Arunachal Pradesh, Brahmaputra in Assam, and cosmos that comprises the Brahmaputra–Ganga delta, Jamuna, Padma and Meghna in Bangladesh. There were journeying from the mountain ranges to the sea. art installations, video installations, poetry, dance, music Nadir Kul Nai, Kinar Nai, a video installation by filmmaker and conversations. Parasher Baruah, featured inhabitants of the Chars of Assam In trying to explore the six life-stages of the river, poet and through their songs, their relationship with the river, their writer Sumana Roy asked, is it possible to discover something struggle for survival, and the issue of migration and identity. new about the river through our poets? She then turned to a The gallery had a Listening Post with songs of the river, and selection of poems to seek a different dis-‘course’. a video of Bhupen Hazarika’s conversations with the river. National Geographic explorer and photographer Arati Kumar The ‘sky-river’ is one of the most tumultuous river expeditions Rao’s detailed studies of the river was the gallery highlight. in the world. This labyrinthine adventure was captured through real-time footage by cinematographer Apal Singh. Ian Baker gave an illustrated and interactive talk, ‘Visions of Paradise in the Tsangpo–Brahmaputra Gorge’. Dancer Surjit N. from Manipur’s choreographed piece, ‘1 sq. ft. on Migration and Displacement’ opened the festival. There was also a fascinating inlay of maps, archival material and photographs in an exhibition, ‘Brahmaputra: Red River Tales’. Fusion musicians Chaar Yaar presented a concert, and traditional tea-tasting sessions concluded the festival. From the exhibition at the festival ■ TEAM ARTEAST 1 human faces— Moving Pictures out of which one struck me as a self- EXHIBITION portrait, and Malik Moments of Being. Paintings by Subhash told me it was to Malik express resistance 17 to 23 April to war. Malik, now 87 years old, has Malik is a widely published cultural anthropologist who been painting for worked at the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, and his own pleasure, has over 15 books to his credit. The books are on diverse for the sake of Paintings by Subhash Malik subjects like art, anthropology, philosophy, history; one painting, for the is entitled The Moments of Being, from which the theme sake of expression; in Mukteshwar, he painted the walls of the exhibition originated. The books reflect his holistic of his house from the outside to make them look like a thinking regarding science and humanities, and appear to part of the landscape. Though he doesn’t believe he is connect closely with his artistic endeavours. an artist, he appears to have worked fearlessly, as he Malik’s paintings are in water colour, oil, crayons and wished, undaunted by the art world, by people around some mixed media work on wood panels where he used him, by scale or material, effortlessly creating images broken crockery. They were softly evocative of life and of nature’s beauty and its overpowering presence in the landscapes he came across in Baroda, Shimla and human lives. Mukteshwar. Spontaneous expressions of tranquillity, the ■ SABA HASAN passage of time, love of nature, trees, dome-like ruins, the anti-Jew, racial discrimination of the Nazi regime. She Remembering Anne Frank begins to write her diary, addressed to ‘Kitty’, an imaginary friend, as her confidante. Initially the writings are typical of EXHIBITION a young teen, but with the changing political season, she Anne Frank: A History for Today records the dangers that her family lives through in hiding in an annexe in a warehouse. COLLABORATION: The Anne Frank House, Amsterdam; Peace Works, an initiative of The exhibition showed us incidents which were most the Seagull Foundation for the Arts; and relevant in the destruction of Jews by the Nazis. Embassy of the Netherlands & Israel—Spirit ‘Kristallnacht’, or the night of broken glass in 1938, of Creativity describes the destruction and deportation of Jews to concentration camps. 18 to 29 April Writing in those troubled times was Anne’s refuge, her Seldom in the history of mankind has there been such solace and also her fear. When the family was finally a courageous young girl, who braved the perils of the betrayed and rounded up, their journey in the various Second World War, and lived through the dangers of the camps from Westerbork, to Auschwitz, and finally to Holocaust. Bergen Belsen, was well documented in the exhibition. Designed and executed by the Anne Frank House, and Anne died in February 1945, and it was only after the war supported by the Embassy of the Netherlands, this that her father, the sole survivor, was handed over the simple but informative exhibition made you want to read diary by Miep Gies. Otto Frank fulfilled his daughter’s wish each panel and sit through a short documentary film. In to become an author, and once published, till date, this monochromatic tones, with interesting visual imagery and poignant book continues to be a bestseller. textual information, the exhibit told us the story of the well-known young Jewish girl, Anne Frank, juxtaposed to It was good to see so many school students taking a some critical incidents of the war. keen interest in the exhibition. No doubt the story can still enthral. In chronological sequence, the story unfolds with Anne ■ LOLITA DUTTA as an impressionable 13-year-old, already exposed to 2 indeed inspirational. The photo exhibition showcased the Inspirational Journeys success stories of women over the last 100 years and more in nuanced fields of physics, molecular biology, etc. EXHIBITION Inaugurated on International Women’s Day, the content Celebrating Indian Women in Science: An was a treasure of information about the journeys of women Incredible Journey contributing to research, education and the application of scientific knowledge. The simplicity of the presentation INAUGURATION: Shri N.N. Vohra, President, indeed created awe for the grit and commitment of these IIC, and Renu Swarup; Secy, DBT, GOI women of science in the country. COLLABORATION: Department of The contributions of women from around the country Biotechnology, Ministry of Science and who left a mark on strategic scientific planning, rural Technology, Govt. of India technology, as well as health, sanitation and nutrition 8 to 15 March 2019 of tribal women, were presented. Brief professional sketches conveyed how their work in scientific fields had discovered ways to improve the quality of life—such as acquiring state-of-the art equipment to make predictions of weather, or using indigenous tribal ingredients to innovate a health drink. Despite cultural restraints on women’s participation in higher education and research, more than 40 women are testimony to female competence for highly specialised roles in research and teaching of science. Their stories defy all social gender- assumed images. Many more young women can aspire to be women on the march, holding the flag for advances in Inaguration of the Exhibition science. Data also indicates that the work environment is women friendly for the women-specific biological onus of This exhibition on 40 women scientists, presented through childbearing and child care. 10 panels of posters with visual and textual content, was ■ ASHA SINGH logically, she added. The hedgehog, according to Berlin, The Aura of Isaiah Berlin viewed the world through a single defining idea, whereas SEMINAR the fox was susceptible to a wide variety of influences. Ramin Jahanbegloo shared that he met Berlin in 1988, Seminar on Isaiah Berlin and later wrote about him. He described Berlin as a Opening Address: Prof. Kathleen A leading liberal thinker of the 20th century. Modrowski R. Sudarshan said that Berlin had a pivotal influence on Keynote Address: Prof. Ramin Jahanbegloo the modern concepts of civil and political rights. Neera 1 March 2019 Chandhoke compared Berlin’s idea of pluralistic thought to the Indian concept of swaraj or independence. In his The seminar commemorated the 50th anniversary of Sir summing up, renowned poet Ashok Vajpeyi spoke of the Isaiah Berlin’s famous lecture ‘Two Concepts of Liberty’, immense influence Berlin’s prose had on him. He recalled which was delivered at Oxford University on 31 October that Berlin, while working in the British embassy in Moscow, 1958. The lecture focused on the concepts of ‘Positive was in touch with dissident writers like Anna Akhmatova. and Negative Liberty’ as defined by the Russian–British ■ ARVINDAR SINGH philosopher. The Vice Chancellor of O. P. Jindal Global University, C. Raj Kumar, said that the study of philosophy as a discipline was to celebrate the ideas of theorists like Berlin. Kathleen A. Modrowski mentioned that Berlin’s ideas appealed to the youth. His famous essay, ‘The Hedgehog and the Fox’, was meant to categorise writers Panellists at the Seminar 3 These shadow images were inspired by Japanese Hoksai Magical Imagery Prints of the Edo era. They transported us to the land of the Bamboo Princess. PERFORMANCE A child sitting next to me gasped, and the lady in front was The Bamboo Princess surprised when the bamboo came to life, and the cherry COLLABORATION: Japan Foundation, blossoms and clouds evaporated into thin air.