Cultural venues in Amritsar resume operations with a promise

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, November 17

Cultural spaces in the city have come back to some sort of life by hosting minimal creative activities, looking to bring the audience back post Covid-19 lockdown. The creative discourse had shifted to virtual media during the lockdown to keep the momentum. With the reopening of major cultural venues in the city, the possibility of resuming the live creative experience seems quite promising.

Thakar Singh Art Gallery resumed its operations in the first week of November by hosting a play, “Love Guru”, where a selected audience of mostly officials from the district administration was invited. “Covid-19 has taken us all to the nerves and more so, it had an impact on the cultural landscape. We hosted the play with a prospect to encourage more people to come in for our art shows and events. If they were convinced and endorsed the fact that we conducted our live theatre safely, maybe others will be willing to come too,” said Arvinder Chamak, general secretary, IAFA, who is also an artist himself.

The gallery has hosted a crafts exhibition of local artisans and another solo show by an artist after reopening. “I believe that creative discourse requires intimate medium and the move towards virtual mode was just temporary survival tactic. We have to start the cultural/creative activities and events to instill confidence in our audience and to normalise the situation,” said Chamak. IAFA is also planning to host the annual state art exhibition and festival in the coming weeks and a seven-day-long live crafts workshop featuring artisans and weavers from Punjab.

KT Kala, another gallery and museum space promoting art and local artists, has been continuing its art shows online, latest one being an exhibition of art works by artist Simar Kapoor. It is open only for staff currently but plans to reopen soon. Virsa Vihar, whose president is theatre personality Kewal Dhaliwal, has been performing live theatre plays since last month, will reopen in the first week of December. “One has to bring back the cultural calendar of the city as we know that we have to live with Covid-19. It will be a challenge to bring in audience but it has to be done. We have been carrying out development work of Virsa Vihar for prepare for reopening,” said Dhaliwal, who recently performed the play, “Agg Di Jayi Da Geet”, written by him and based on the Hathras victim.