Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2009

Kala Ghoda is a district in South Bombay.
It is named after a statue of a Black Horse with the Prince of Charles mounted on it that once used to be in the square.

That statue was moved to Jijamata Udyan but the name has persisted over the years.

This street is the heart of Mumbai's Art district. It is home to the Jehangir Art Gallery, the Beautiful David Sasoon Reading Hall, Max Mueller Bhavan, Prince of Wales Museum, National Gallery of Modern Art and the once Regal now in shambles Watson Hotel.

The Watson hotel housed some renowned guests like Mark Twain. Legend also has it that it was being denied entry at this "Only British" hotel, that inspired JRD Tata to build the Taj Mahal Hotel.

One of my personal favorites at this square is Samovar - the cafe within Jehangir Art Gallery. Yes, the Kala Ghoda Sqaure is where History meets Art meets Architecture meets Pride.

Yesterday I visited the Kala Ghoda Arts Festival and Street Fair.

Apart from rubbing shoulders with some of Bombays oldest and most renowned buildings, walking the grey black paved streets which horses once trotted on and taking a deep breath at the David Sasoon Reading Library ..just trying to absorb it all... I also walked the street fair circuit which had NGO's from all over India, handicrafts from Handloom to Pottery to Orissa handicraft, home made soaps and paper mache acessories.

Bright colors and Grey pavements made a pretty sight and a wonderful afternoon.

I was particularly impressed by the some of the art exhibits that were on display at Rampart Row. Here are briefs on some of them.

Made in "Chai -na" : A satirical take at the influx of Chinese goods into the world. "Chai" in Hindi also means Tea and "Na" means No. :) Made me smile.

Scorpion: The center piece of the art exhibit was a giant metal scorpio with baby scorpios crawling all over it. The essence of this exhibit was that Bombay city is like a Huge Scorpio - that hosts a zillion demands on it - the baby scorpios. If the baby scorpios grow too large in number - the mother is no longer able to support them and dies out of exhaustion. This art piece was high on impact - visual and otherwise.

How long can you stand for it: This was a room that depicted the sorry state of affairs for the poor people in Bombay wrt to Sanitation and Personal Hygiene. It showed statstics of the number of people in Bombay without access to toilets who use the streets and creeks for relieving themselves. And then asked the viewers a rhetoric "How long can you stand for it"

Postcards to Pakistan: A wall mounted with postcards that visitors could write to Pakistan. It was very moving and insightful to read some of the postcards written. While I waited - there was a group of school kids filling postcards. It really made me think about the urgency that needs to be woven into political decisions India makes in the days to come.

A Woman's Alley: I particularly liked this one for its impactful depiction of the everyday violence that plagues women in certain parts of India.

The 8th Wonder of the world: My personal favorite at this years fest. The 8th wonder of the world was a three story tall pyramid. Its one side was made of buckets, the other side of taps and the third of bottles. These are all instruments with which we deplete the most precious resource we have - Water. Some say that oil prices be dammed. The wars of the future will be fought over water. I am not inclined to disagree.

I really liked the day I spent at the Kala Ghoda Festival. I definately think that Bombay needs more of these street festivals. We live in a city that has so much history, art and culture. It was a great day to absorb some impactful thoughts and ideas through art - this side of the world.

The air was so thick with the smell of art and fusion you could almost smell it.

Needless to say I loved it.

The Festival continues to be on till Feb 15th. I highly recommend a Dekkho.

Special Mention to Sujoy, Aditya and Madhav who made the trip possible. You'll rock.