The National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi is celebrating Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav with Kala Kumbh- artist workshops for painting scrolls representing the heroic lives and struggles of unsung heroes of India’s freedom movement, as an integral part of the Republic Day celebrations 2022 in collaboration with Ministry of Defense. The workshop is being organised from 10th – 17th December, 2021 at Bhubaneswar to creatively showcase the legacy of India’s freedom struggle and our national pride on five scrolls of seventy five meters. Similar workshops will also be held in other parts of the country.
Kala Kumbh workshop intends to showcase our rich cultural heritage of indigenous and contemporary visual art practices, focusing on diverse geographical locations of India. Inspiration will also be drawn from the creative illustrations in the Constitution of India wherein the artistic elements painted by Nandalal Bose and his team have imparted a distinctive appeal. It will be an embodiment of progressive aspects of India’s socio-cultural, political and economic identity, represented on the scrolls as per the artistic vision of Sri Adwait Garanayak, Director General, NGMA.
As the entire program focuses on a collaborative effort, the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi has joined hands with Kalinga Institute of Industrial Technology and Silicon Institute of Technology in Bhubaneswar for this artists’ workshop. The narratives would reflect the tales of valor from Odisha, Bihar, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Bengal, North Eastern parts of India and Andhra Pradesh with artistic expressions reflecting the indigenous forms of art such as Pattachitra, Talapatra chitra, Manjusa, Madhubani and Jadupatua to name a few. As NGMA, New Delhi takes these workshops to other parts of the country, many other forms of indigenous art will be woven into the stories of the unsung heroes of India’s freedom movement as a befitting artistic tribute to their struggles.
