November is the start of New Delhi’s busiest months in terms of its cultural calendar. And so it comes as no surprise that the arts head of the British Council, Adam Pushkin, 35, is a very busy man at the moment.
Reaping seeds sown in the past two-and-a-half years, Mr Pushkin shares with The Asian Age an interesting lineup of cultural events the city can look forward to in the coming months, and even grander plans for 2012.
“We have a hectic schedule until February all over the country. I am excited to talk about a theatre tour, Mind Walking (November 8-10), a collaborative production between UK-based circus theatre company Bandbazi and the Mumbai-based Q Theatre Productions. Mind Walking is an “aerial drama” written by British-Asian playwright Tanika Gupta. It came together during a British Council networking programme in Edinburgh two years ago: “We brought theatre people from India and the UK on one platform and people started talking to each other, and realised they had ideas in common,” he says.
Mr Pushkin also mentions Meet Mr Big (November 15), the Hay Festival Kerala (November 17-19) and the National Dance Company of Wales Tour (December 7) as must-watch events. “Meet Mr Big is a kids’ performance. Ed Vere is a writer and illustrator for children who combines reading with live drawing. Some may describe his work as risqué, but he does fun things for kids,” says Mr Pushkin, who plans to attend the Hay Festival Kerala in Thiruvananthapuram this year. He also mentions “Tipping Point” a two-day conference in Bengaluru next weekend where 30 artistes and 30 scientists will explore responses to climate change.
Talking about the British Council’s focus, Mr Pushkin says: “We’re trying to build relationships between the UK and Indian creative sectors because those creations lead to collaborations. We’re trying to create relationships between artists from the UK and audiences so they have a wider knowledge about the UK and its cultural diversity.”
January 2012 will see the next edition of Writer’s Block, a festival of new theatre with 12 emerging Indian playwrights who’ve been a part of a workshop in London.
Another distinctive project is an opera in November-December 2012 titled Babur in London by Indian poet Jeet Thayil, in which he is collaborating with a British composer. Babur in London is about the Mughal emperor’s ghost who appears to a group of fundamentalists in 21st century London on the eve of a suicide mission — where he engages them in a wide-ranging debate about poetry, love and war, and changes the course of their mission.
Through projects like this, Mr Pushkin says, “we’re trying to see art not only as a medium to reach people, but also to make them think”.
He goes on to describe two more interesting items in the lineup over the coming months. Raghu Dixit Project and British folk band Bellow Head are working on a musical theatre project based on tales from Karnataka giving them a contemporary twist. This will premiere in London in April. Snow Queen is another major children’s event due in August, reimagined and adapted by Anupama Chandra Saikia from Chennai and produced by Unicorn Theatre.
Adam Pushkin, who has spent the past three years in India, says he loves it here. “I would take a thousand years to fully get to know India. It’s a tremendously welcoming country. I have a special connection: my mother and grandmother were born here. My grandma’s family were railway workers and engineers in 1870, so there’s lots of family history here.”