Celebrate the uniqueness of Auroville

DIFFERENT CITY

In the hussle and bussle of metro cities among lakhs of people, there lies a city called as the ‘City of Dawn’ -- Auroville. It is an experimental city in the state of Tamil Nadu, near Puducherry. To show the uniqueness and experimentative methods of the City, the India International Centre Gallery is holding an art exhibition Transformation – a group show of Auroville artists as part of the Auroville festival from September 14-21.

This will be a unique art event which will bring to Delhi a selection of contemporary art, including painting, sculpture, installation, photography and video by established and emerging Indian and International artists living in Auroville.

A spokesperson from Auroville explains the concept behind the festival, “We want to showcase the innovative, ecological method, its unique architecture and elements of the building of the City. We will be showcasing its art, culture, kind of education and ecology of the City.”

The various artists participating in the exhibition include Adil Writer, Aurelio, Cecilia Cortés, Chantal Gowa, Henk van Putten, Ireno Guerci, Michel Nicolet, Nele Martens, Pierre Legrand, Priya Sundaravalli, Sebastian Cortés, Véronique Nicolet amongst many others.

A week long event the festival includes an international seminar exploring Auroville’s role in society in the form of a future city.

There will also be a series of talks on the unique concept, its experiments in urban design and architecture, affore­s­tation and environmental concerns, different approaches in economy, education, art, literature and the crafts as well as collaboration with the local region.

In addition, there will be several films and art exhibitions showcasing work from scores of artists both from India and abroad.

The festival promises to bring together personalities from diverse fields together and includes eminent names like Dr Karan Singh, Mark Tully, Aster Patel, Mallika Sarabai, Vishakha Desai, Soli Sorabji and Malini Parthasarthy amongst several others on a single platform.

Auroville is a universal township where people from 15 nationalities live together. It was founded as a project of the Sri Aurobindo Society in February 1968 by Mirra Alfassa, ‘The Mother’.

It aims at becoming a model of the ‘city of the future’ or ‘the city the earth needs’. The charter of Auroville confirms that it belongs to nobody in particular but to humanity as a whole.