ART is LIFE 2021
The second edition of MAP’s annual festival, Art is Life: SoundFrames was conceptualised, designed and themed around music, to virtually explore the power of the museum, and music, to bring people together. Curated by Sadhana Rao and produced in collaboration with Berklee College of Music, SoundFrames presented a number of never-before-seen performances, lecture demonstrations, panel discussions, educational workshops and exhibitions, which explored a range of genres in music, from the classical to the contemporary.
The festival brought together a host of famous personalities and ensembles, including Ambi & Bindu Subramaniam of SubraMania, Grammy-winner Ricky Kej, IndianRaga, Penn Masala, Hindustani Classical maestro Pandit Sanjeev Abhyankar, Carnatic vocalist Gowri Ramnarayan, the Durbari Qawwals of Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya Dargah, and internationally acclaimed DJ Sandunes, among many others.
ONLINE EXHIBITIONS
Make sure you explore the two exhibitions curated around music by the MAP curatorial team, especially for Art is Life: SoundFrames.
Sights and Sounds is a unique digital experience in sound and visual art and brings together sonic interpretations created by the Mumbai based company BrandMusiq of six artworks in MAP’s collection. Each artwork evokes a mix of emotions like fear, joy and melancholy, inviting you to perceive works of art sonically in order to empower an aesthetic experience through the act of listening.
Rock City recalls an era of rock and pop concerts in the early 2000s in Bangalore, Delhi and Mumbai. The heart of this exhibition is DNA Networks’s founder Venkat Vardhan’s personal guitar collection, signed by bands like the Rolling Stones, Metallica and Deep Purple, accompanied by video clips of these concerts and anecdotes from the audience. Each guitar, autographed frame and concert video are portals to a time that defined rock culture in India. The exhibition captures the loyalty and love for rock concerts with stories of people who swayed, jumped and head banged to the emotions of music.
FESTIVAL CURATOR
Sadhana Rao is a research-led writer and curator in the arts and culture space. She has written on arts, film festivals, music, crafts, travel, literature, and socio-economical subjects for leading newspapers, magazines and journals including The Hindu, The Economic Times, Deccan Chronicle, Tehelka and Housecalls. Her writing style knits history with the literary, and the classical with the contemporary.
Building on the plinth of her research and writing experience, Rao has been a contributor, curator, speaker and moderator for music, literature, art and film segments at festivals and platforms, including the Mahindra Kabira Festival, Cannes Film Festival, AVID Learning, Royal Opera House Mumbai, Think Fest, Bangalore Literature Festival, Bangalore International Centre, Jaipur Literature Festival, FICCI – Creative Industries as well as corporate summits.
With her sustained interest in arts’ pedagogies, she founded ‘Art Links Learning’ to create age appropriate curriculum for imparting music and arts intelligence.
She continues to live in Bengaluru and be a student of the arts.
CURATORIAL NOTE
How do music makers and artists use just seven notes, playing with their permutations and combinations, to create unique musical repertoires? How do the idioms of composition, melody and harmony define music? What role do the depth of lyrics, the structure of rhythm, and textures of sound play? Exploring such pertinent questions and ideas, the second edition of MAP’s annual digital festival highlighted the power of music and the arts, while also showcasing the interconnectedness of all various art forms. The festival was curated to be a sampling of the richness and range of music across genders, geographies and genres found in India and the world, and also to explore the mechanics, language, and modes of music today. Featuring both mainstream sounds and voices from the edge, Art is Life: SoundFrames looked at innovative and disruptive forms of musical engagement from across the globe.
The festival was designed as an immersive musical experience like none other and for diverse audiences of all age groups, genders, interests and abilities. As part of our aim of making the arts accessible to all, the festival provided additional accessibility features such as Indian Sign Language interpretation, subtitles and audio description for viewers.
MEET THE FESTIVAL TEAM
Arnika Ahldag
Associate Curator
Carolina Artegiani
Head of Development
Clifford Jeffrey
Digital Assets Manager
Debangana Kundu
Video Content Creator
Ishwari Arambam
Events Coordinator
Kamini Sawhney
Director
Krittika Kumari
Digital Editor
Kunal Mehta
Inclusion Manager
Mehreen Yousaf
Events coordinator
Mohammed Razooq
Administration Manager
Mounika Nallani
Development Assistant
Riya Kumar
Curatorial Assistant
Shaina Jagtiani
Head of Communications & PR
Shilpa Vijayakrishnan
Head of Education & Outreach
Shruti Kondi
Events Coordinator
Surya H K
Events Manager
Tanushree Kulkarni
Development Officer
Vaishnavi Kambadur
Assistant Curator
ART is LIFE 2020
The inaugural edition of MAP’s annual digital festival, Art is Life, was curated to celebrate the digital launch of the Museum in December 2020. With a week-long series of events, audiences journeyed through the MAP collection with cultural experts, performers and other museum partners to experience the interconnectedness of the arts.
ABOUT MAP
The Museum of Art & Photography (MAP) will be south India’s first major private museum. Situated in Bengaluru, MAP’s mission is to take art and culture to the heart of the community, making it accessible to diverse audiences, and to create a museum-going culture that encourages people to experience art and heritage in new ways. The museum will be a space for ideas and conversations that are initiated through its collection, enabling us to engage with audiences in multiple ways.
Housed in a state-of-the-art facility, MAP’s five-storey building on Kasturba Road, will include galleries, an auditorium, an art and research library, an education centre, a specialised research and conservation facility, as well as a terrace cafe. The building is currently under construction and is set to open to the public in 2022.
MAP’s activities have already expanded beyond the four walls of a traditional museum space. Having launched in December 2020, MAP’s Digital Museum, one of the first in India, curates non-stop art experiences for audiences of all ages, from online exhibitions to a range of articles and essays, collaborations with museums around the world, engaging talks by leading industry figures, and educational resources for kids and adults.