Rearview | In 2023, artistes made up for pandemic desolation, brought audiences into halls

Pune maintained its traditional stronghold on theatre with some bold experiments through the months. In March, Mohit Takalkar-directed Hunkaroo, with a stylised stage design and performance grammar, won almost every award, from Best Production, Best Stage Design and Best Director to Best Light Design and Best Ensemble, at one of India’s top competitions, the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards (META) in Delhi. Another top category at META, Best Female Actor, was won by the indomitable Lavani performer Shakuntalabai Nagarkar for Lavani ke Rang, a play that has audiences dancing.

Meeting of Minds

When dancer Rujuta Soman collaborated with theatre actor-director Atul Pethe to make a performance, Mallpractice and The Show, in April, it was a coming together of different genres, conversations and experiments instead of following an established storyline or performance style. The effect was powerful, with a packed hall at The Box held in its grip.

Mallpractice and The Show (Express Photo)

Across the spectrum, artists were pushing the envelope by stepping into new terrains. Takalkar created Ghanta, Ghanta, Ghanta, Ghanta, Ghanta in August with a team that included a lawyer, a political science student and a JNU graduate rather than only seasoned stage actors. “The idea was to see where the energy takes us,” the director had said at the time.

Fittingly, Pune was one of the venues of a national tour of an iconic production, Mumbai-based Atul Kumar’s Piya Behrupiya, which was bringing down the curtains after more than a decade. Nautanki met William Shakespeare’s blank verse, live music shared space with audience interactions— and it all held together like a good memory.

More Space to Create

When it comes to visual art, Pune continues to lag behind other major cities— and there are no signs that 2024 will be different. The city did get a new space for art, Vesavar Art Gallery. Making art accessible, the gallery’s popular exhibitions included photographs taken on an iPhone of the Vittal Birdev Yatra of Kolhapur, and abstract representations of the freedom struggle as a tribute to 75 years of Independence.

Tracing_theThreads by Monali Meher at VHC (Express Photo)

The city’s contemporary art gallery, VHC, keeps the doors open for artists with new ideas. Apart from representing the city on national and global shows, the gallery is wrapping up the year by announcing its first grant for young artists. “The grant is targeted at practising visual artists, under 30, from Pune. The monetary grant seeks to support them at a key juncture of their career, empowering them to experiment with their practice and explore new avenues of making,” says Vida Heydari, owner of the gallery.

Classical Frontiers

Pune remains on the cusp of classical traditions and contemporary explorations in dance and music. The year’s headline musical event, the 69th Sawai Gandharva Bhimsen Mahotsav, attracted more than 6,000 people each of the five days. Here, too, there was a sign of changing times — Abhijit Pohankar quietly brought in a synthesiser for the first time to the festival and blurred the boundaries between Indian and Western instruments.

Hrishikesh Pawar (Express Photo)

In dance, Hrishikesh Pawar was not only the most active but also unafraid. A Kathak and contemporary dancer, he made a solo that interrogates modern ideas about poet-saint Kabir. An equally powerful work was by his students, who presented pieces on five mental health conditions, from ADHD to OCD and depression. Pawar is closing the year with an exhibition and workshops about a German choreographer, dancer and leader of the dance company Sasha Waltz and Guests at the Pune Handmade Papers. “I think of Pune as a dance city. Dancers wish that Pune had more spaces, critical think tanks and consistant work on various platforms,” says Pawar.

A Different Note
AR Rahman might have taken India to the Grammy stage, but he was asked to get off the dais in Pune in May when his concert crossed the permissible time limit. In a video that went viral, Senior Police Inspector Santosh Patil is seen going on stage and gesturing to Rahman and the performers to stop the show. Patil later said that he was just doing his job.