A mix of young and senior artists from Baroda and Hyderabad share their experiences at a one-of-its kind woodcut camp at DHI Art Space

As one walks pasts the flowy curtains, a woodcut zone awaits art lovers at DHI Art Space at Dharam Karan Road in Ameerpet. A group of young artists, Gayathri, Jagadeesh and Kiran are casually chatting away. In front of them are a bottle of linseed oil, wooden blocks and colours against a background that blares the number Apologise. One can spot Vijay Bagodi, professor of MS University, Baroda sitting with a wooden block and Hyderabad artists Srikanth Kuruva and Sajid Bin Amar sharing nuances of woodcut techniques. While T. Sudhakar Reddy, (retd) professor of AU University watches the proceedings, artist Rajeshwar Rao is busy poring over on an image on the block at his worktable. But the real sight is to see veteran artist Thota Vaikuntam turn a student to learn the basics of woodcut painting!

It is a one-of-its kind week-long woodcut camp at DHI Art Space with a mix of young and senior artists from Baroda and Hyderabad. It is a delectable hub of all things arty and wooden at the camp with the gallery exhibiting artists’ previous works. Besides interactions and observing each other’s style of working, the artists, who are staying on the first floor of the building, also participate in talks and sessions over cups of black coffee and chai. “The unlimited scope of woodcut is at the core of the camp,” informs Bhargavi. “The work is too intricate and the whole process is quite laborious. Most of them do not know about it and artists who know do not practice it. We wanted to bring woodcut and non-woodcut painters under one roof and create a platform for interaction. There are veterans, middle aged and younger artists who share and exchange their ideas and experiences.”

While in Hyderabad Vijay Bagodi was at JNTU, attending a lecture by Tushar Gandhi. The professor says by the end of the session, he knew the theme for his woodcut painting as he shows us a block with Mahatma Gandhi’s image. “Being a small city, Baroda is a great place for artists. One can just call Mani sir (K.G. Subramanyan) or Jairam Patel and they will meet you. The place is buzzing with art,” he smiles as he talks about Baroda.

There is a sense of palpable excitement as artist Rajeshwar Rao walks around with wooden blocks. “It is a new thing and I am learning how it works,” says Vaikuntam with a smile. “Wood is a totally different media and the colours are different. It is good for artists like me as it is a break from the usual and getting to know about textures. I have seen my friends and great masters at work. I have realised it is a very challenging process,” he adds.

As the artists are busy on their worktables, one cannot miss a two-and-half-year old girl running around. Artist Karuna has brought along her little daughter as she participates in the camp. “Wood cut painting is like doing meditation — one goes into a different world of wood and colours. I work on the natural wood and this is compressed wood,” she says while displaying a block. With a laugh she looks at her daughter and adds, “She piles up the dust and makes a rangoli of the chipped out parts.” The camp is also a different experience for artists like Prathap Modi who is used to working on large scale projects. “It is a challenge to work on small wooden blocks and also I like to work alone. This is a new experience as I am trying to mingle with other people,” he says.

Art lovers and budding artists can drop in before February 27 at the Art Space to discover the world of woodcut.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Features> MetroPlus / by Neerja Murthy / Hyderabad – February 25th, 2015

Amirbai Karnataki is one of the earliest Kannada singer-actress who made it big in Hindi cinema. She went to Bombay when women artistes were labelled ‘fallen’, but with grit and passion Amirbai became a star and sang 380 songs in 150 Kannada and Hindi films

For someone who didn’t belong to the gramophone generation but the golden period of radio, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhonsle, Mukesh, and Rafi ruled our hearts and constituted our imagination of a film song. The same AIR, during a light music programme, had played “Ninnane Neneyuta Ratriya Kalede”. This, was a carbon copy of Lata’s memorable “Saari Saari Raat Teri Yaad Sataye”, but the voice was starkly different. It had a heavy nasal tone, and the flawless rendition had a simplicity to it. The charming song left an indelible mark and I felt I had to recover her voice from pages that were unknown to me. Amirbai Karnataki was an unheard voice for the Seventies: she was long gone, and had faded into the archives of black and white era of early films. She was someone who lived on in personal memories of people who had known and heard her.

Amirbai Karnataki (1912-65), who sang 380 songs in 150 films, was an early singer and actress of Hindi cinema. This singer who sang the unforgettable “Main to pavan chali hoon bole papiha” and “Bairan Nindiya Kyon Nahi Aaye”, was born in Bijapur in Karnataka. During the 1930s Amirbai was a prominent name along with stars like Suraiyya, Shamshad Begum, Noor Jahan and Zohrabai Ambalewali.

When Lata Mangeshkar came on to the scene, many of these singers moved into the background and for the later generations they remained unknown.

Born into a family of artistes, Amirbai’s parents Ameenabi and Husensaab worked for a theatre company and even ran one for many years. Growing up years for Amirbai and her five siblings was filled with music and theatre, what with many of her uncles and aunts being top musicians and actors in theatre. She lost her father early and her uncle, Hatel Saheb took care of all the children.

During those years, Bijapur was part of Mumbai Presidency and the sangeet natak tradition in these parts was flourishing. The famous Balagandharva’s company and several other theatre companies camped at Bijapur; Amirbai and her sister Goharbai, trained as they were in classical music, impressed these companies with their singing and they began to not only sing for several of them, but also act.

As Rahmat Tarikere writes in his biography of Amirbai Karnataki, Amirbai moved from Bijapur to Mumbai, from theatre to films. But the exact date and nature of these movements and transitions are hard to tell. The story of Amirbai is a sum total of several happenings in a historical period as there are few definitive documents to lead us to any accurate picture. Painstakingly put together by the biographer, Tarikere says that when Amirbai reached Mumbai (it was perhaps the year of Alam Ara’s release, 1931), women who worked in films, theatre and music were still seen as “fallen”.

Women artistes were often ridiculed as “free women” and among the several women performers, Amirbai and her sister Goharbai too, tried to free women of this stigma. In fact, families not only disowned such women, but there were instances of women being killed for choosing the arts.

In fact, Rahmat Tarikere says that the kind of fight these women put up with the social circumstances of those days is no less significant than the freedom struggle itself. If women artistes, in the later years, earned fame and reputation, it was because of the sacrifices these women made. Ironically, two very popular films “Basant” and “Kismet” in which Amirbai acted deals with the plight of actresses.

Amirbai became a very reputed singer and actress of her times. She was highly paid, and even built a theatre Amir Talkies in Bijapur. She travelled the length and breadth of North Karnataka giving programmes related to theatre and cinema.

A singer who sang some of the finest love songs, had a very unhappy love life though. Tarikere writes how her husband, a Parsi actor who played villain in those days, Himalayavala, abused her physically and emotionally. She had to suffer several assaults from him and even separation became a painful affair. Unable to recover from the trauma, she went into oblivion for several years, and later Badri Kanchawala, with his love and care brought back peace into her life.

At the age of 55, Amirbai passed away; Karnataka had been unified by then and the rest of Karnataka hardly knew of her. Even the newspapers reported her death four days later. It was only later that people have slowly learnt of Amirbai’s greatness and how Gandhiji was immensely fond of her rendition of “Vaishnava Janato”.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Features> MetroPlus / by Deepa Ganesh / February 27th, 2015

Crowds thronged the 12th All-India Urdu Kitab Mela at the Jamia Millia Islamia,being held for the fourth time in Capital. The nine-day book fair,organised by the National Council for Promotion Of Urdu Language (NCPUL),was inaugurated by noted Hindi film lyricist and Rajya Sabha MP Javed Akhtar and actor Shabana Azmi on Saturday.

“For centuries,Urdu has been propagating the ideas of secularism even before the word ‘secularism’ was invented in the West,” said Akhtar. “ It is unfortunate that today in our country,where languages are associated with regions,Urdu is the only language which has been tied to a particular religion.”

“Those who try to dump Urdu forget that it is very deeply connected to Indian culture,and if we forsake Urdu it will be a great loss to our culture. Beware of throwing the baby with the bathwater,” he said.

Referring to the recent rendition of Urdu shers by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Leader of Oppostion Sushma Swaraj while debating in Parliament,Shabana Azmi said: “Only shayari cannot help a language survive,for the language should be that of communication and for daily usage. We must also take into account the economic aspect of the issue,” she said.

The mela,which usually has around 100 stalls of publishers from Hyderabad,Aurangabad,Bhopal,Srinagar and Bangalore,has roped in around 45 stalls this year,mostly from Delhi. Among the prominent stalls are NCUPL,Anjuman Taraqqi-e-Urdu Hind,Jamia Maktaba,and the Ghalib Institute.

The NCUPL stall showcases books on as many as 1,500 subjects. The stall of Anjuman Taraqqi-e-Urdu Hind presents a large section on books from Pakistan,which is an opportunity for Indian authors and readers to get acquainted with recent developments in the Urdu literary circle of Pakistan,according to the stall manager.

Organising such a fair exclusively for Urdu has its own importance,said Professor Shahryar. “This will prove wrong the rumours that Urdu is dying. With so many stall exclusively selling Urdu books and young people who are eager to buy them,the future of Urdu is glorious,” he said.

Some visitors,however,pointed out the predominance of religious books over those on fiction and poetry. Subhan Ali,a resident of Ghaziabad,said: “I was hoping to find some rare books. Barring a few exceptions,the stalls are filled with religious books,which one can easily get elsewhere. It would have been better if the stalls had focussed on poetry and secular literature,” he said.

Jnanpith Award-winning Urdu poet Professor Shahryar and Group Editor of the Rashtriya Sahara Roznama Aziz Burney were other eminent personalities at the inauguration.

The reporter is a student of the Express Institute of Media Studies

source: http://www.indianexpress.com / The Indian Express / Home> Cities> Delhi / by  Atikh Rashid, New Delhi / March 28th, 2011

Bengaluru  :

Bengalureans can now walk into the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) and treat themselves to vocal and instrumental music of legendary singers, free of cost.

Carnatic and Hindustani musicians like Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavathar, Shemmangudi Srinivasa Iyer, M S Subbulakshmi, N Ramani, T R Mahalingam, D K Pattamal, Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan will be available at the newly set-up digital music archive.

Vikram Sampath, executive director, IGNCA, southern region, said: “I started working on the project soon after I took charge of the centre a year ago. R T Chari, MD of TAG Corporation, shared 1,000 hours of live recordings of Carnatic music since the 1930s. They are from his collection that he has put together in the past 30 years, digitized and catalogued.”

The collections include concerts of artistes like Chembai, Subbulakshmi, K V Narayanaswamy, Alathur Brothers and M D Ramanathan.

Vikram, too, donated his collections from the Archive of Indian Music (AIM). “They include recordings on gramophone discs from 1902 in Hindustani and Carnatic music, folk music, movies and plays. Works of Gauhar Jaan, Peara Sahab, Kesarbai Kerkar, Ariyakudi Ramanuja Iyengar, Salem Godavari, Bidaram Krishnappa, Veene Sheshanna, Bal Gandharva, K L Saigal, P Kalinga Rao and speeches of Mahatma Gandhi, Rabindranath Tagore and Subhash Chandra Bose are part of this collection,” he said.

Chari also helped IGNCA develop user-friendly software that allows users to select songs by using parametres like raga, genre and names of composers/singers. They are categorized in alphabetical order. He has also donated paintings and murals of Indian music icons to adorn the walls of the archival unit.

The unit, reprography and library are open from Monday to Friday between 9.30 am and 5.30pm.

Contact: executivedirector.igncasrc@ gmail.com

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Bengaluru / by G S Kumar, TNN / February 24th, 2015