March 18, 2014 | 6.30 pm
Studio X, Mumbai

Brutalism is a style of architecture which was part of the International Style of Architecture that demanded a different approach towards architectural design. The term New Brutalism was first applied in 1953 by the British architects, Peter Smithson and Alison Smithson. These two architects along with Eduardo Paolozzi, Nigel Henderson, Richard Hamilton and James Sterling among others, formed the Independent Group, and in the same year, organized the exhibition ‘Parallel to Life and Art’ held at the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London. New Brutalism has come to acquire strong political associations in Sau Paulo and elsewhere, with many architectural projects being conceived in this aesthetic. In some instances, its sublime qualities extend from churches to a flower-shop. The lecture will consider the ideas of New Brutalism in the context of the Group and the ICA, and the limitations of this conception. Expanding on the origin of the term (Jean Dubuffet), and its relation to certain continental preoccupations with age-old aesthetic qualities, the speaker will connect to other movements such as Outsider Art or Art Brut. This presentation will also seek to connect the recent search for a rhetoric of materiality and temporality with age-old preoccupations in art and architecture, and the debates which brought about the demise of some key buildings conceived and executed by Brutalists. References will also be made to the Metabolists, which was a group formed by young Japanese architects and city planners in the late 1950s, and as much pioneers as Le Corbusier. In a certain sense, this presentation is conceived as a contribution to the ongoing debate on the subject, and will also discuss such architecture in England and India.

Yehuda E. Safran studied art, architecture and philosophy at the Saint Martin’s School of Art, the Royal College of Art, and the University College, London respectively. He has lectured and held fellowships at many international universities and published widely in scholarly journals. Currently, he lives and works in New York, where he directs the Potlatch journal and the Research Lab for Art and Architecture and teaches at Columbia University Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation.

Mustansir Dalvi is Professor of architecture at the Sir J.J. College of Architecture, Mumbai. He has published in well-known journals such as Domus, Art India, The Economic and Political Weekly, Marg and the Journal of the Indian Institute of Architects, among others. He also writes two columns in Time Out Mumbai and Firstpost, where he observes and critiques.

July 25, 2013 | 6.30 pm
Visitors’ Centre, CSMVS, Mumbai

This panel discussion is an exploration of how the politics of hope play out in differing fields–from the aspirations of India’s poorest inhabitants, to the offices of urban planners and business people–to understand how we aim to achieve progress, creating an ethos of trust and joint risk-taking. How do all sections of society find access to growth, justice, and a part in the development story? The way that events are perceived and experienced, in a world with ever more information and connectivity, shapes outcomes in profound ways. What new forms of cosmopolitanism and relationships have emerged, and how does this define our society? How can we understand globalisation in relation to phenomena such as violence, commodification, nationalism, terror and materiality?

Arjun Appadurai is the Goddard Professor of Media, Culture, and Communication at New York University. During his academic career, he has held professorial chairs at Yale University, the University of Chicago and the University of Pennsylvania. He has authored numerous books and scholarly articles including Fear of Small Numbers: An Essay on the Geography of Anger and Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. He has served as a consultant or advisor to a wide range of public and private organizations, UNESCO, UNDP and the World Bank.
Shaina Anand is a filmmaker and artist who has been working independently in film and video since 2001. In 2007 she co-founded CAMP, a collaborative studio that works on interrelated concerns and possibilities of art, technology, archives and the public sphere. CAMP’s artworks are technically intensive and conceptually challenging and have been exhibited at major art venues in recent years including Documenta 13 in Kassel.

Ajit Balakrishnan is the Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Rediff.com, a news, information, entertainment and shopping portal headquartered in Mumbai. He is also Chairman of the Board of Governors of The Indian Institute of Management Calcutta and Chairman of the Working Group of Internet Governance set up by the Government of India. He has written a book titled The Wave Rider: A Chronicle of the Information Age and writes a column for Business Standard.

Mick Gordon is the CEO of Ipsos India, a private research think-tank in the fields of media and advertising ranked as the world’s third largest research agency. He focuses on consumer, health and business-focused primary research, analysis, interpretation and consultation. He was formerly Managing Director of Synovate India and Financial Director of Sample Surveys.

Zarina Mehta is the Managing Trustee of Swades Foundation. Previously known as SHARE (Society to Heal Aid Restore Educate), Swades Foundation operates to empower rural India. Mehta is also one of the three Founder-Directors of UTV, one of India’s foremost media and entertainment conglomerates, which is now Disney UTV. She has been featured in Business Today’s Most Powerful Women in Indian Business List for the last three years.

Sheela Patel is the Founder and Director of SPARC, an NGO that addresses the problems of women pavement dwellers in Mumbai. She was the recipient of the 2011 Padma Shri award from the government of India. She was a key figure in the building up of Mahila Milan, a decentralized network of collectives of women living on pavements and in slums in different parts of India. Under Patel’s leadership, SPARC has catalyzed the construction of housing for over 8,500 families and over 500,000 toilets and latrines, with programmes in 70 cities in India.

Teesta Setalvad is an educationist, journalist and human rights activist. She was the recipient of the 2007 Padma Shri award from the government of India. She co-edits Communalism Combat, heads and directs Education for a Plural India programme, and is Secretary of Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP). Her other awards include the 2003 Nuernberg Human Rights Award, the 2009 FIMA Excellence Award by the Federation of Indian Muslim Associations in Kuwait and the 2000 Human Rights Award of the Dalit Liberation Education Trust.

The Future of Asia series, co-produced by Mohile Parikh Center and Asia Society India Centre, brings together a diverse group of speakers from across the world to explore the Future of Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective. Each speaker addresses this theme through a distinct lens provided from his or her discipline, offering unique insights into what we can expect for Asia, and how we can shape a positive, sustainable future for the continent.

January 17, 2013 | 6.30 pm
Auditorium, National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai

The discussion will focus on how regional identity has shaped the formation and efficacy of federalism in India, and the extent to which this system of governance has been a success. Ashutosh Varshney will investigate this theme drawing on comparisons with Sri Lanka, Pakistan and Indonesia, and will reflect on how these countries’ governance structures map against respective cultures and identities to reveal ground realities in a new light. He will be joined in a discussion with Pramit Pal Chaudhuri to explore how these elements stand to shape the future of Asia.

Ashutosh Varshney joined Brown faculty in January 2009. Previously, he taught at Harvard and the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. He was the 2008 winner of the Guggenheim fellowship and the Carnegie Scholar awards. His Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus and Muslims in India won the Gregory Luebbert Prize of the American Political Science Association. His Democracy, Development and the Countryside: Urban-Rural Struggles in India, in its PhD dissertation form, won the Daniel Lerner Prize at MIT. His research and teaching cover three areas: Political Economy of Development, Indian Politics, and Ethnicity and Nationalism. His academic papers have appeared in prestigious professional journals internationally. In addition, he also contributes guest columns to newspapers and magazines.

Pramit Pal Chaudhuri is the Foreign Editor of Hindustan Times. He specializes in India’s international security and economic policy. His experience includes participating as a delegate in Indo-US Strategic Dialogues, serving as South Asia Fellow at the Henry Stimson Centre, as Visiting Fellow at Cornell University’s South Asia department, and as editorial writer for The Telegraph and The Statesman newspapers. He is also an Associate Fellow at Asia Society.

The Future of Asia series, co-produced by Mohile Parikh Center and Asia Society India Centre, brings together a diverse group of speakers from across the world to explore the Future of Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective. Each speaker addresses this theme through a distinct lens provided from his or her discipline, offering unique insights into what we can expect for Asia, and how we can shape a positive, sustainable future for the continent.

December 15 to 19, 2012 | 9.30 am to 5.30 pm
Studio X, Kitab Mahal, Fort, Mumbai

The Value of Culture course, developed and implemented by the Centre for Research in Arts and Economics (CREARE), Netherlands, will be offered in Mumbai (India) in collaboration with the Mohile Parikh Center (MPC), Mumbai.

The arts play an increasingly important role in modern society while creativity is becoming a driving force. Organizations want to be creative, professionals seek creative work and the economy of the future has to be a creative economy. A new world asks for a new perspective, and to understand the role of the arts, implies an awareness of the value that creative industries play in our contemporary times.

In the context of developing countries, there is a lack of basic infrastructure and financial support, with culture being relegated to a subsidiary issue in economic policies. Strategies and programmes take a rather static approach while budget allocations for culture are a fraction of national budgets and often ineffectively utilized or underutilized. At the same time, support from the private sector to culture is time limited and necessarily selective. Also, there is a limited exchange between cultural actors and stakeholders and most function out of isolated positions rather than as networked systems.

Even in developed nations, the funding models and support to arts and culture have undergone radical cuts given the global economic crisis. For arts and cultural organizations to sustain themselves and continue to offer creative programs, they are forced to think differently and act otherwise. A dynamic relationship between cultural entrepreneurship and sustainability, the role of new technologies, creating innovative and socially relevant products, services and working processes seems to be the way forward to manage this crisis. To do so, art and cultural practitioners and managers need to grasp a better understanding of the manner in which the cultural sector operates, especially how it relates to the society and economy.

This short, five days intensive course offers the cultural economic perspective. It introduces new concepts, other ways of thinking that students in a variety of disciplines can apply in their study and from which practitioners in the cultural sector can benefit. It will explore the characteristics of cultural industries and environments that foster creativity in economy and society as a whole. One of the questions addressed is how all these aspects of creativity can contribute to better government policies and better leadership in professional organizations. The course, for 15 selected participants, will provide both theoretical and practical knowledge. As part of the process participants will learn by interacting with texts, teachers, and with each other.

Arjo Klamer is professor of Cultural Economics at the Erasmus University, Rotterdam. Before that he taught at various universities in the US. He is often invited as a guest lecturer at universities in the Netherlands and abroad, as well as for talks for business groups, government organizations and the general public. His research focuses on the relationship between culture and the economy. One of his major research topics is the value of culture. He conducted a research project on behalf of the European Parliament on ‘The financing of art and culture in Europe”.

Lyudmila Petrova graduated in MA in Cultural Economics and Cultural Entrepreneurship at the Erasmus School of History, Culture and Communication, Rotterdam. She is in the last year of her PhD research at the same department. She is teaching on ‘Creativity and economy’ at various international programs. She worked on international researches, among the others a research project commissioned by the European Parliament on “The financing for the arts and culture within the EU”. Her research interests include the economics of arts and culture, international perspectives of cultural policies, financing the arts and interdisciplinary aspects of creativity.

Anna Mignosa studied Economics at the University of Catania. She took her PhD at the Faculty of History and Arts Erasmus University, Rotterdam. She teaches and conducts research on cultural policies, economics of cultural heritage, and economics of the art markets. Since 2010 she is a member of the board of the Association of Cultural Economics International (ACEI) and she is a Canon Foundation Fellow for the year 2007. She conducted a research project on behalf of the European Parliament on “The financing of art and culture in Europe”.

Priyateja Kotipalli hails form Mumbai, India. His work focuses on formulation of policy and the role culture and heritage have for economic development. Before becoming a PhD candidate at Erasmus University he was working as Sr. Lecturer in the area of Strategic Management and Research Methods at ITM Group of Institutions. He holds a Masters in Business Administration from the National Institute of Tourism and Hospitality and a bachelors degree in Heritage Management from K.C College, University of Mumbai.

July 31, 2012 | 6.30 pm
Auditorium, National Gallery of Modern Art, Mumbai

With the rise of China, India and other Asian countries, new notions of modernity and culture are gaining global prominence. As these forms interact with preexisting ones, particularly with Western cultural ethos and norms, what kinds of adjustments and clashes can we expect to see as countries and individuals define themselves and their relation to the world order? With many slating China to become the world’s largest economy within the next 20 years, what cultural and ideological shifts will be felt within China, among its neighbours including India, and across far reaching corners of the world? How can we expect perceptions of modernity itself to change, and what impact will this have on institutions within these countries? Join Martin Jacques in conversation with Mark Tully in an exploration of these questions, as he argues how China, being civilization-state rather than a nation-state, will pave the way fora fundamentally different tomorrow. The discussion will be chaired by James Crabtree.

Martin Jacques is the author of the global best-seller When China Rules the World: The End of the Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order. He is a Senior Visiting Fellow at IDEAS, a centre for diplomacy and grand strategy at the London School of Economics, and a Visiting Professor at Tsinghua University, Beijing. He has been a columnist for many newspapers, made several television programmes and is a former Deputy Editor of The Independent newspaper. He is also a Fellow at the Transatlantic Academy, Washington DC. He has previously been a Visiting Professor at Renmin University, the International Centre for Chinese Studies, Aichi University, Nagoya, and Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto. He was formerly the Editor of the renowned London-based monthly Marxism Today, and was Co-founder of the think-tank Demos.

Sir Mark Tully is a leading British broadcaster and writer, and is a recipient of the major British award for journalism, the Bafta Dimbleby Award. He has served as BBC’s Bureau Chief in New Delhi, and was awarded the Padma Shree and Padma Shushan Awards from the Government of India. Tully was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1985, and was knighted in the New Year Honours 2002. He is the author of several books, including Raj to Rajiv: 40 Years of Indian Independence, India: Forty Years of Independence, The Heart of India, India’s Unending Journey, and Non Stop India.

James Crabtree is the Mumbai Correspondent for the Financial Times. He previously worked as policy advisor in the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit, and is a trustee of the charity mySocietyorg, one of the UK’s most innovative technology organizations.

The Future of Asia series, co-produced by Mobile Parikh Center and Asia Society India Centre, brings together a diverse group of speakers from across the world to explore the Future of Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective. Each speaker addresses this theme through a distinct lens provided from his or her discipline, offering unique insights into what we can expect for Asia, and how we can shape a positive, sustainable future for the continent. In the inaugural year of the three-year series had the theme of Migration. This year, speakers will explore the theme of Identity and Culture.

December 9, 2011 | 6.30 pm
Forum Room, Taj President Hotel, Mumbai

The defining feature of this century is the rise of the Asia Pacific: economic, political, military and strategic influence is moving to our part of the world. The reality of this power and influence has arrived faster than many expected or are prepared for. This landscape also includes non-traditional security challenges such as terrorism, piracy, maritime security and natural disasters. For these reasons, Australia and India share a number of strategic interests. Indian Ocean region maritime security issues, and regional security architecture provide opportunities for increased engagement, to tackle the challenges of the regional strategic environment.

The Australian Defence Minister, Stephen Smith, and Pramit Pal Chaudhuri, Foreign Editor of Hindustan Times, discuss defence and strategic issues of mutual interest for India and Australia in the Asia Pacific Century.

Stephen Smith was sworn in as Australian Minister for Defence in 2010. He has also served as Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Principal Private Secretary to the Attorney-General of Western Australia, and Special Adviser to the Prime Minister, among other positions.

Pramit Pal Chaudhuri is the Foreign Editor of Hindustan Times. He specializes in India’s international security and economic policy. His experience includes participating as a delegate in Indo-US Strategic Dialogues, serving as South Asia Fellow at the Henry Stimson Centre, as Visiting Fellow at Cornell University’s South Asia department, and as editorial writer for The Telegraph and The Statesman newspapers. He is also an Associate Fellow at Asia Society.

The Future of Asia series, co-produced by Mohile Parikh Center and Asia Society India Centre, brings together a diverse group of speakers from across the world to explore the Future of Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective. Each speaker addresses this theme through a distinct lens provided from his or her discipline, offering unique insights into what we can expect for Asia, and how we can shape a positive, sustainable future for the continent.

December 7, 2011 | 6.30 pm
Cama Hall, K.R. Cama Oriental Institute, Mumbai

Almost everything around us appears to be disintegrating–institutions, beliefs, values and even individuals. The authority of the Parliament is being challenged by civil society, caste-based khap panchayats are violating the constitution and the Lokpal is likely to become a power centre, larger and stronger than parliament, judiciary and bureaucracy. The idea of ‘linguistic states’ has come into conflict with the advocates of smaller states and while the collapse of socialist ideology was to establish the capitalist principle there is greater inequality and conflicts in the liberalized and globalised scenario. Liberal Democracies were to put an end to fundamentalist ideologies and intolerant attitudes; in reality, both have grown. It is a world with borders and conflicts where individuality is replaced by individualism; idealism is replaced by cynicism and ethics by pragmatism. The spectre of anarchy is an overwhelming reality; are there any alternatives to the problems of our times?

Kumar Ketkar is the Chief Editor of Dainik Divya Marathi of DNA Group. Earlier, he served as the Chief Editor of Loksatta, the leading Marathi Daily of the Indian Express Group. He also served as the Editor-In-Chief, Lokmat and Maharashtra Times and is the recipient of many prestigious awards. He is known for his social and cultural concerns and has personally been engaged in theatre, literature and environmental activities. Ketkar has a keen interest in history and anthropology; particularly in music, cinema, painting, architecture and language.

October 14 to 16, 2011 | 9:30 am to 5:30 pm
YMCA Seminar Room, Mumbai

Why a course on thinking? After all, if there is anything that we think we do all the time, it is thinking. But then here is the sad truth: thinking is a skill, is a method, and has to be taught.

What does it mean to teach thinking? It is to recognize what thinking is, what happens to us when we think, how we actually think, the different ways by which we think. It is to understand what is meant by critical thinking and creative thinking, to reflect on the different types of thinking and imagining that characterizes art, science and philosophy. It is also to recognize why philosophy is fundamentally about understanding the nature of thinking.

What might one learn from this reflection on thinking? Here is a wish-list:
• learning to be aware of what we do when we think
• understanding the relation between thinking and language
• an introduction to the philosophy of mind
• nature of logical thinking and creative thinking (not that they are opposites of each other!)
• theories of imagination
• learning to read and write (no, this is not an adult literacy class but reading and writing are fundamentally related to the skills of thinking)

Warning: This course will be injurious to your health – it is not a management course but one that draws primarily on philosophy.

Day 1: On Thinking about Thinking
We will begin with exploring the experience of thinking. What happens to us when we think? How do we recognize the elements of this experience? What does an awareness of this experience teach us about the nature of thinking? Does thinking involve the body or only the mind? How is it that many of us think alike if thinking is such a private activity? What is the special relationship between the mind and the act of thinking? And yes, by the way, what exactly is this thing called the mind?

We will also begin the exploration of the relation between thinking and language. Is all thinking in language? Can we think without any ‘language’? Do we think better in any specific language? Do we think in pictures? Is that also like thinking in language? If we think in a language does it mean that my thinking is constrained by that language? What exactly do we think about? Ideas? Concepts?…

Day 2: Critical and Creative Thinking
We will try and understand the nature of logic and its relationship with thinking. Why has logic often been referred to as the ‘laws of thought’? Does logic force us to think in the same manner? We will look at different types of logic, including Indian logic, to understand some basic truths about thinking. Is thinking a particular form of reasoning? Is scientific thinking a form of critical thinking?

The second session will be on creative thinking. Is creative thinking a skill? Can it be taught? Is it a method? What does it mean to be a creative thinker? How does creativity arise? Is all of artistic thinking creative thinking? Is there a relation between artistic thinking and logical thinking? Is creativity in science different from creativity in art?

Day 3: From Imagination to Reading/Writing
Is imagination a form of thinking? But what is so special to imagination? How have various thinkers understood the nature of imagination? We will look at various theories of imagination to get a grasp of this elusive concept.

Thinking and imagination have an essential relationship with the acts of reading and writing. What is so special to reading and writing? After all, these are skills we learn in primary school. Hmm. Think again. And again. We actually do not know how to read. And do not know what we are doing when we are writing. So we will think about how thinking is related to the acts of reading and writing.

Welcome to the land of philosophy where nothing is what it seems.

Sundar Sarukkai is Professor and Director, Manipal Centre for Philosophy and Humanities, Manipal University, where an innovative MA program in interdisciplinary humanities has been started. He is trained in physics and philosophy, and has a PhD from Purdue University. His research interests include Philosophy of Science and Mathematics, Philosophy of Language and Philosophy of Art. Sarukkai has been a Homi Bhabha Fellow, Fellow of the Shimla Institute of Advanced Studies and PHISPC Associate Fellow. He is the author of the following books: Translating the world: Science and Language, Philosophy of Symmetry, and Indian Philosophy and Philosophy of Science. His forthcoming books include What is Science? and The Cracked Mirror: An Indian Debate on Experience and Theory (co-authored with Gopal Guru).

September 8, 2011 | 6.30 pm
Rangswar Hall, Y. B. Chavan Centre, Mumbai

Ashis Nandy will trace how the ideas of an Asian future–note the singular–and that of the diverse but compatible futures of Asian societies during colonial times have gradually given way to a uniform, steamrolled future created through a globalized idea of development where even isolated, impotent, symbolic dissent from such a future is feared as dangerous threat and a security hazard. The example and success of Japan has prompted China and India to opt for a similar model of development and they too have been conspicuously successful in their efforts in recent times. But the success have given them rather limited self-confidence—limited by the standardised vision of a post-Westphalian nation-state. Can we be ourselves in our official idea of a future world? Can the deepening of democracy be a protection, at least in India? Do cultures exist for States or States exist for cultures? Is there life beyond strategic studies and comparative economic growth?

Ashis Nandy is a political psychologist, a social theorist, and a contemporary cultural and political critic. His body of work covers a variety of topics, including public conscience, mass violence, and dialogues of civilizations. He was Senior Fellow and Director of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), New Delhi for several years. Today, he is a Senior Honorary Fellow at CSDS and the Chairperson of the Committee for Cultural Choices and Global Futures, New Delhi. He has been also a Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center, Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Study, Berlin, and Regent’s Fellow, University of California, Los Angeles.

Kumar Ketkar is the Chief Editor of Dainik Divya Marathi of DNA Group. Earlier, he served as the Chief Editor of Loksatta, the leading Marathi Daily of the Indian Express Group. He also served as the Editor-In-Chief, Lokmat and Maharashtra Times and is the recipient of many prestigious awards. He is known for his social and cultural concerns and has personally been engaged in theatre, literature and environmental activities. Ketkar has a keen interest in history and anthropology; particularly in music, cinema, painting, architecture and language.

The Future of Asia series, co-produced by Mohile Parikh Center and Asia Society India Centre, brings together a diverse group of speakers from across the world to explore the Future of Asia from a multidisciplinary perspective. Each speaker addresses this theme through a distinct lens provided from his or her discipline, offering unique insights into what we can expect for Asia, and how we can shape a positive, sustainable future for the continent.

August 26 to 28, 2011 | 9:30 am to 5:30 pm
YMCA Seminar Room, Mumbai

The 2010 course for Art History intends to take off from where the 2009 course concluded, tracing the idea of the ‘modern’ (itself an infinitely vexed and much contested category) as it manifests through linguistic, thematic, conceptual as well as stylistic shifts from the terminal stages of the courtly traditions to the advent of new practices around the nineteen forties. The course does not intend to be overtly theoretical, save where such deductions evolve from the material of our concern, the visual images themselves; it would rather be an exercise in ‘looking’ at art and attempting to ‘read’ them contextually. The decades following the nineteen forties have been intentionally compressed into the second half of the final day, with the hope that this post-script will once again become an introductory lead to a more detailed and specialized presentation in a future course.

Lectures:
Day I:

1. A short introduction with two coordinates: (a) locating ‘modern’ in a context called India, & (b) tracing the shifts via art as pictorial language – ‘reading’ visual images
2. Early encounters: (i) from the courtly traditions to the phenomenon of the “Company school”; (ii) the urban transformation of the folk, as in Kalighat “pata” paintings; (iii) the “Bat-tala” prints of Kolkata
3. “Ravana fighting Jatayu” by Raja Ravi Varma: pictorial realism and recreation of a mythic past
4. “The hunchback of the fish bone” and “Sindbad the sailor” from the ‘Arabian Nights’ series by
Abanindranath Tagore: stepping beyond the nationalist prerogatives of a ‘new’ Indian pictorial style
5. Gaganendranath Tagore’s “The coming of the princess” & Rabindranath Tagore’s portraits – claims to a tradition infinitely larger than the indigenous

Day II:

6. The “Halakarshana mural” at Sriniketan by Nandalal Bose – re-invocation of the mural tradition at Santiniketan and the contextuality of theme and language
7. Benodebehari Mukherjee’s tile mural in Kala Bhavana – a visual statement about tactile space: a proposition for the aural
8. The “Thresher” by Ramkinkar Baij as a distinctive sculptural statement of the ‘Famine’ of 1943- 44
9. A proposition for shifting our attention from the Jamini Roy of the paintings to the Jamini Roy of the drawings – the issue of the folk in a contemporary artist’s personal expression
10. Amrita Sher-Gil: from the “Two Girls” to the “Ancient story-teller

Day III:

11. The artists’ collectives of the 1940s and an aspiration towards internationalism – the Calcutta Group (Kolkata) and the Progressive Artists’ Group (Mumbai)
12. Political convictions and that brief moment of a social realism in Indian art of the 1940s – Chittaprosad’s “Hungry Bengal” and Somnath Hore’s “Tebhagar diary”
13. An overview to the subsequent decades, through a random selection of examples, tracing the shifting concerns in theme and content, language and style, medium and material

Dr. Sanjoy Kumar Mallik, Senior Lecturer in the Department of History of Art at Kala Bhavana, Visva Bharati (Santiniketan), is a graduate in Painting from Visva Bharati, and holds a post-graduate and a doctoral degree in Art History from the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda.With a master’s-level dissertation on the pictorial language and narrative structure in 17th century ‘Malwa’ miniatures, and a doctoral thesis addressing the issue of the ‘modern’ in Bengal for the transitory decade of the nineteenforties, his interest ranges from traditional Indian art to issues of contemporary practice. His essays have appeared in the art history journals Nandan (Visva Bharati, Santiniketan), Bichitra (Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata), Lalit Kala Contemporary (Lalit Kala Akademi, New Delhi), Varta/discussing art (Akar Prakar Art, Kolkata) and Art & Deal (Art Konsult, New Delhi). He has contributed modest sections on the art of the nineteen-forties to the publications Indian Art: an overview” (Ed. Gayatri Sinha; Rupa & Co., New Delhi, 2004), and Art and Visual Culture in India: 1857 – 2007 (Ed. Gayatri Sinha; Marg Publications, Mumbai and Bodhi Art Gallery, New Delhi, 2009). Apart from several catalogue notes for exhibitions, one of his major projects has been a comprehensive book on the artistic oeuvre of the artist Chittaprosad (for a private gallery based in New Delhi), the publication of which has been conceived to coincide with a touring retrospective exhibition of the artist in the near future. He had also been invited by the Lalit Kala Akademy to curate a travelling exhibition to Cairo, titled To opt is to commit/ young artists from India (October 2008).