Kolkata, regarded by many as the cultural capital of India, along with the university town of Santiniketan — a sanctuary for art and literature for years — will have an artistic winter this year. The two locations will host the first edition of the Bengal Biennale, a celebration of art that will see the participation of over 100 artists, performers, scholars, curators and cultural practitioners. “It seeks to invoke the multilayered cultural heritage and intellectual history of a liberal Bengal. The theme would traverse through cross-currents that shaped Bengal’s vibrant artistic heritage and intellectual traditions right from the time of Abanindranath Tagore to more contemporary experimentations in art from Bengal and beyond. The inclusive approach to modernism blended Indian traditions and philosophies with Pan-Asian and Western influences, leading to cosmopolitanism and pluralistic artistic expression,” says curator Siddharth Sivakumar.
With two dominantly overlapping segments, the event will be held from November 29 to December 22 in Santiniketan, and December 6 to January 5 in Kolkata. Organised by Gameplan Foundation, it will be spread over more than 20 venues, including the Indian Museum, Victoria Memorial, Birla Academy of Art and Culture and Netaji Bhawan in Kolkata, and Arthshila and Somnath Hore’s studio in Santiniketan. While fine art will be in focus and the biennale will feature multiple exhibitions and significant works of participating artists, the engagements will also extend to musical and theatrical performances, heritage walks and workshops. Curatorial fellowship for young talent under the age of 25 is also part of the programming. “With the two major schools of art in Bengal, to have a biennale here seems like the most obvious thing to do. It was an idea waiting to be implemented, and the response we’ve got from artists across India and overseas has been tremendous,” says Malavika Banerjee, trustee of the biennale and director of Kolkata Literary Meet.
The advisory panel for the event includes artist Jogen Chowdhury, authors Siddhartha Mukherjee and Amitav Ghosh, and gallerists Rakhi Sarkar and Prateek Raja. The participating artists include TV Santhosh, Sudhir Patwardhan, Paula Sengupta and Dayanita Singh, among others. “In a country where we don’t have several public institutions, we need as many biennales as possible. These are important to reach out to the larger public, and also for artists to experiment without having to think of aspects such as commerce,” says Singh. At the Indian Museum, she will be showing her “Museum of Tanpura” and a museum that features her journeys on the “musicians bus” (organised by the Sangeet Research Academy) with musicians such as Ustad Zakir Hussain, Pandit Vijay Kichlu and structures dedicated to the Ustad late Rashid Khan and Kishori Amonkar.
The artistic traditions of the region invoked through the biennale will also include the distinguished Bankura horses. In the coming months, young art students across the state will be painting 60 Bankura horses that will be placed at some of the different locations of the biennale.
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