Bengaluru to host mega cultural festival for tribal arts in January

Bengaluru: To address the challenges in bringing folk arts from across regions on a single platform, a three-day mega cultural festival for tribal arts – ‘Kalayatra’ – will be organised from January 24 to 26, 2025 at Karnataka Chitrakala Parishath (KCP). 

As a precursor to the mega fest, a seminar on ‘Survival of Folk and Tribal Arts - Challenges and Solutions,’ was organised in the city on Saturday, by Infosys Foundation and Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan in collaboration with Karnataka Janapada Parishath, Karnataka Janapada Academy and the research centre of KCP. 

While Kalayatra is expected to bring together more than 100 folk and tribal arts, it is seen as a potential move in filling the void of an “absent industry” for folk arts, which is often present for other sectors like modern and contemporary art. 

Folklorist Hi Chi Boralingaiah, also Chairman of KCP, said creation of an industry for traditional folk and tribal arts with government, administrative and corporate interventions is the need of the hour to encourage its practitioners and recognise their work. 

“To come together on a single platform in the form of an industry, just like any other field, is important even in folk arts. So many tribal folk artists residing in the nook and cranny of rural villages of this vast country are often made to remain there. It is time we bring them to the fore,” he said. 

Speaking about puppetry and how it is often claimed to be a “dying art” by Western scholars, Padmashri awardee master puppeteer Anupama Hosakere shed light on various styles in puppet making and performing from across India.

“Puppeteering was passed on to generations as a family tradition. But since there is no solid intervention to economize this tradition, the youth naturally take up professions like construction works or jobs in call centres. Where are we going?,” she wondered, adding that government interventions to encourage the youths to take up folk arts as a mainstream profession was
crucial.