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With their geometrical patterns and shaded spaces, India’s stepwells have always been a photographer’s delight. They have inspired numerous books, the latest of which is American photographer Claudio Cambon’s To Reach the Source: The Stepwells of India, published in February by ORO Publishers, USA. At a presentation organised by Arthashila Ahmedabad on Sunday, the author recalls his […]
The board over the box office proudly says “House Full” and 30 minutes before the show is set to begin, a long queue wends through the gates to the road. Natarani is ending the season with a big bang Usha Uthup concert and Mallika Sarabhai greets everyone at the entrance to the amphitheatre with a […]
Natarani plans to end the winter season on Saturday with a Usha Uthup concert, which is already sold out. Before the big bang concert however, it served up something more cerebral last week, in the form of two minimalist plays: After All, a solo show by Solene Weinachter from Scotland and Anandowari, a Hindi play on the life of […]
Bespoke Art Gallery is a beautiful space but it does not yet attract Ahmedabad’s art set in the way older, more established galleries do. This could possibly be because it is located a bit far from the city centre, off Sindhu Bhavan Road, but then, so is 079 Stories, which always attracts a big crowd […]
The Indigo Art Museum was meant to be shifted from the Kasturbhai Lalbhai Museum property in Shahibag to Arvind’s manufacturing campus, where it really belongs, but that plan seems to have been shelved. It has made itself even more at home in Shahibag now, with the addition of a series of new artworks. Titled Latent Echoes, the […]
Sahir Ludhianvi was undoubtedly the most successful lyricists of his time, with evergreen songs like Kabhi Kabhi Mere Dil Mein and Jo Wada Kiya Wo Nibhana Parega to his credit. Actor-Director Danish Husain’s new play, Main Pal Do Pal Ka Shayar Hoon, staged at Natarani on Friday, celebrates the poet’s talent and achievements. But was he a nice person? Not really. […]
It is going to be a busy weekend at Anant National University with two events that bring together the spiritual and material realms. The first event, which was inaugurated on Friday morning, is an international conference on indigenous knowledge systems and practices. In the evening, the campus will host WITH 2025, an international festival being […]
Ziskakan, the French band from Reunion Island, rocked Natarani on Friday, with beats that set the amphitheatre vibrating. In her introduction, Natarani director Mallika Sarabhai urged the audience to come dance on stage, which seemed difficult at first, given that Ziskakan is a six-member band and the stage was rather full, with two drum sets, […]
For her Woman of Bangalore project, French artist Olympe Ramakrishna has created a series of oil paintings of close friends. Other artists might have stopped there, but Olympe decided to give her work a twist. Using digital tech, she has printed the images from her canvases on silk saris. The results, currently on display at the French […]
Ahmedabad audiences were treated to a beguiling performance at Natrani on Sunday, in the form of Shoot the Cameraman by Luxembourg dance company AWA. Combining the cinematic with the theatrical, the show tells a story of power and abuse, seen live as well as through the lens of two cameras as they follow the players on stage. […]
With its undulating lawns speckled with sculpture, Ahmedabad’s Kanoria Centre for Art is surely one of the most charming exhibition venues in the city. The place has a resort-like feel to it, especially if you sit sipping chai at the outdoor canteen space that is one of the centre’s attractions. The Centre was at its busiest best […]
Sufi singer Indira Naik brought a touch of Sufiyana to Natarani amphitheatre on Friday, with a 90-minute concert that had Ahmedabad’s ever-enthusiastic audience swaying and clapping to her beats. Starting with Amir Khusrau classic Man Kunto Maula, she sang some of the most famous songs in the genre, including Mast Kalandar and Khwaja Mere Khwaja, which have been rendered even more […]
Natarani ended the year with a two-and-a-half-hour high energy concert by Sona Mahapatra on Monday. Wearing a belted electric-blue gown and cowgirl boots, the lady dazzled the audience with her moves, as she sang her biggest hits. In between, she kept up an easy banter with the audience on subjects like feminism, trans power, Shyam […]
The 45th Vikram Sarabhai International Arts Festival opened at Natarani on Saturday with the premier of Meanwhile Elsewhere, a visually spectacular production inspired by Italo Calvino’s Invisible Cities. Written and directed by Yadavan Chandran, Creative Director of Darpana Academy, the play is an Indo-Italian co-production, sponsored by Nexion, an Italian company with operations in Morbi. Italo Calvino was one […]
December 21 is celebrated as World Saree Day. Saree, a traditional Indian outfit that has undergone changes in the manner it is draped, is now loved the world over also. Gujarat’s Patola, Bandhani and Gharchola are also most sought after. Today we share details about these three types of sarees. Patola Patola, a traditional handwoven silk fabric, […]
The opening of an art exhibition in Ahmedabad usually incorporates a round of speeches by ‘dignitaries’. This can be a tad tedious for those who have just come to see the art, but it does serve to provide a structure to the event and an ice breaker for the socialising that follows. The opening of Woman […]
Deepika Rathod’s story is one of both resilience and a deep-seated desire to be successful at whatever she does. Born and brought up in Ahmedabad, Deepika lost her eyesight suddenly when she was 14 years old. Doctors said the cause was a crack in the retina. Despite years of treatment, her eyesight has not been […]
Getting a great shot of lions in the wild requires hard work, perseverance, and loads of luck. So does having your photographs published in the form of a coffee table book. Wild life photographer Rohan Trivedi has managed to do both, with the publication of The Lions of Bharat, a collection of 97 portraits of the Asiatic lion, […]
Satish Christian’s ever-smiling face has always reflected that for him his work, hairstyling, is a passion. On many days, he would work long hours during the peak of his career. But he never allowed tedium or tiredness to impact the joy he derived from his work. Even in times of personal joys and sorrows, India’s […]
Ten-year-old piano prodigy Ayaan Deshpande wowed Ahmedabad’s Western classical music aficionados at a Symphony Orchestra of India (SOI) concert at Natarani on Saturday. Clad in a silk red suit vest and bowtie, the curly-haired youngster played Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.21, a difficult, but very popular score. Composed in 1785, when Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was 29 years […]
