Search results for: 'maya the bee'

Colonization is perhaps best understood as a process that unfolded over time than as a single historical event. In India and South Asia it began with the East India Company acquiring rights over land in different parts of the country, with the occasional political victories won on the battlefields. Since the Battle of Plassey (1757), their power over legislative and judicial matters grew steadily, backed by a strong military presence. Following the First War of Independence in 1857, the British Crown brought most parts of the Indian subcontinent under its direct rule, continuing to hold power until 1947.

One of the most distinguished families in Bengal, the Tagores exercised unparalleled influence over the cultural landscape of the region. The Nobel Laureate, Rabindranath Tagore (1861 - 1941), and two of his nephews, Gaganendranath Tagore (1867-1938) and Abanindranath Tagore (1871 - 1951) were recognised as India’s National Art Treasure artists. Sunayani Devi (1875 -1962), their sister, is regarded as one of modern India’s first women painters known by name. Her lyrical paintings and embroideries often looked inward to an imagined world of fables and myths. At the turn of the twentieth century, we see Abanindranath emerging as the founder of the Bengal School as he envisioned a new Indian art that was free of colonial influence, rooted in pan-Asianism. Gaganendranath, on the other hand, was a prolific satirist and cartoonist, who imagined new forms and perspectives inspired by Cubism. Together they formed the influential Indian Society of Oriental Art in 1907, while Rabindranath’s school and university at Santiniketan would continue to shape modern art in Bengal for generations to come.

Tracing the evolution of set design in Bengal, responding to the theatre archive at Natya Sodh Sansthan with scholar Trina Nileema Banerjee. 

An exploration of the instrument by tabla artists, Asif Khan and Rohen Bose, followed by a concert where they are joined by Alla Rakha Kalawant on the sarangi at the Jorasanko Thakur Dalan. 

A workshop on making botanical pigments with the Patachitrakars at Naya Village, who will share their songs and painted scrolls.

Pebet is a ‘phunga wari’, a type of traditional fireside story told to Manipuri children by their grandparents. Directed by the renowned theatre practitioner Heisnam Kanhailal and performed first in 1975, it subverts the familiar icon of the bird and the cat to comment on political and cultural indoctrination.

A guided walk of the first free circulating public library of India—Uttarpara Public Library—with researcher Sarbajit Mitra, traversing the history of regional literary cultures, and sifting through their vast archive to delve into the vibrant world of illustrated periodicals in colonial Bengal, followed by a poetry reading by Sujoy Prasad Chatterjee. 

A musical evening at Prasad Tagore Palace, the heritage residence of Pramantha Tagore, preceded by a conversation with Sujaan Mukherjee about the Tagore family’s ties to music, theatre, and art patronage.