This is not a hiatus

Hello Bombay,

I’m still around – knee deep in a new job and commuting via the infamous Virar local is making it very hard for me to pursue my artist endeavours. But rest assured there is more to come. This is my version of a thank you for your invisible support and stayed tuned for more message. Guest bloggers shall be entrusted with keeping the search going and I will find a way to seek out art on Sunny Sundays.

Until then re-read a few of the previous posts hey? J

Cheers,

Rochelle 

Arty Party!

Alright so I've been sick and lazy and not venturing out into the world - instead I've been hiding at home and trying to write a poem a day for the month of April but I digress. There was this event I really wanted to check out but it coincided with Easter and so I couldn't go. I did the next best thing and asked a friend to guest blog this one for me - which is a good idea I think to have guest writers instead of me rambling on :) So cue in Jai Ranjit aka Zaiu..

Being Easter Sunday, Rochelle was being the nice girl that she is, and spent the day doing Easter-y things with the family. Since she couldn’t make it to the event I’m about to tell you about, she asked me to fill in for her. I’m not kidding when I say that I clapped my hands when I said “Yes!”

Mumbai has been a center for the arts for as long as one can remember, and this is something Visual Disobedience is constantly looking to reinforce. This Easter Sunday was another wonderful example of just that, with the second in what hopefully will be a monthly series of art markets called Arty Party.

I’m an artist, and a member of the artist collective that is Visual Disobedience, which has been nothing but supportive of all of us, Mumbai-based or not. I was invited to become a participating consultant for Arty Party, and it’s something I've definitely loved doing.

This time round, we chose House Of Tales, a gallery space in Mumbai’s art district of Kala Ghoda, and teamed up with Insia Lacewalla’s Small Fry Co. to join forces in presenting the city with an Arty Party full of art, food and alcohol.

The food was great, ranging from burgers and hot dogs from Yellow Box to Cinnamon treats from Icing On Top, to the quintessential Mumbai icon that is the gola from Gogola and lots more. The alcohol came courtesy the wonderful folks at Indian Wine List and HipCask, with the fresh brewed beer from Gateway.

Across the gallery from the food was the space we earmarked for the art (all affordably priced, mind you), which included paintings (handmade and digital) by Vikrant Shitole, Avantika Mathur and Oorna Dutta, prints by me, Priyesh Trivedi, Harshvardhan Kadam, Sachin Shetty, Somdutt Sarkar, Neethi Goldhawk and Saumin Patel, hand-painted lamps and prints by Vandhana Rajan Swamy (Jellyfish), photographs by Parizad D. and Vikas Munipalle, and enamel works by Ishita Savla, plus earrings by Ayesha Kapadia and calendars and posters by The Doodlers.

With all the art already on display, we had The Postcard People bringing a little bit of creative mystery to the space with their “Postcard From A Stranger” project. You’d be greeted joyously by all three of the lovely ladies from The Postcard People, asked to draw something on one postcard and write your own address on another that’d already been drawn on without seeing the design. The idea? That once the event was over, you’d get that postcard with the unknown design in the mail, bringing a smile to your face through the joy of a stranger. I made one, and it was an amazing feeling to create something that I had no clue who would get.

As always, we at Visual Disobedience want more and more people to learn about what it is that we do, and why we do it. To this end, we make sure to include talks and demos in every edition of Arty Party, and this time we had Ahmed Sikander do a cartooning demo, I did a shoe-painting demo and a discussion on Street Art between Harshvardhan Kadam (Inkbrushnme) and Sachin Shetty (Drift).

After all these arty activities had enthralled the audience, we dove head-first into the much anticipated Pub Quiz. With 7 teams participating in the elimination round, we saw some hilarious answers. Once the finalists had been chosen, the battle truly began, with Kruthika Bangera and Astha Mehta coming out on top with a miraculous jump from 0 to 130 points just in the final round, beating everyone out of the water to win the Pub Quiz Hamper of a print by Neethi Goldhawk, a portable phone charger and a pair of fantastic headphones. While personally I had no idea about half the things being asked, the one question I did know the answer to, none of the participants knew! (The question was “Who played Chewbacca in the original Star Wars trilogy?”, and the answer is Peter Mayhew. I only mention this because nobody heard me when I yelled it out from the other end of the room where I was manning the cash counter.)

All in all, we are really happy with the response our artists got, especially our brand new photographers : Parizad D. and Vikas Munipalle. The wines and beer were fantastic, and the folks from IWL and HipCask even more so. They more than took care of all our artists and visitors, and made Arty Party a fantastic place to be when breaking the fast for Lent.

We’re hoping to do an Arty Party every month if we can, or at least as often as possible so that we get to share as much art as we can with all of you. If you missed Arty Party this time round, come next time and take home a piece of art with you! 

The Art of Slam Poetry

The art of slam poetry and me have been friends for about 3 years now. Our relationship has been tumultuous and some days we argue like siblings. We can have conversations that last for a few fleeting minutes yet seem like hours have gone by. We try to be honest with each other.

A Poetry Slam is a for all intents and purposes a competition wherein judges are selected from members of the audience. Judges can be between 3 - 5 people and scoring is generally out of 10, the highest and lowest scores are dropped to avoid any bias.

Before the competition begins, the host will invite a 'sacrificial poet' to perform so that the judges can practise their scoring.

Slams can be held in several rounds for eg: 8-4-2 eight poets in the first round, four in the second and two in the last round. Some slams do not eliminate poets at all and just have the top three scores as winners.

Props, music and costumes are forbidden in slams or any action to sway an audience. This includes the host being superfluous with adulation and support towards certain poets.

As legend goes slam poetry was created by construction worker and poet Marc Smith in 1985 at a Chicago Jazz Club called the Get Me High Lounge.

Marc went on to organise a weekly poetry slam at The Green Mill (another jazz club in Chicago) in 1986 - on 25 July the Uptown Poetry Slam was born and is still going strong.

Slam has since travelled to every corner of the world and while there are those that are anti-slam, it is an art form that is thriving and pushing poets to showcase their talent.

I checked out one such slam event not so long ago in Bombay/Mumabai - The Big Mic was created in 2008 and has since been supporting poetry, comedy, cinema, rap and live music in this colourful city.

The slam was held at The Hive in Khar West, a popular space for creativity and all things expressive.

According to their website - the slam is supposed to have 20 contestants - contestants are supposed to register online when the event goes live. However, this wasn't the case as last minute registrations were accepted which kind of defeats the purpose of a time-bound registration and advertising limited slots in the first place.

The venue was a nice one - a cosy room with a well lit stage - a wonderful audience that stayed put right until the end and a very lively host.

There didn't seem to be a time limit for each performance and some poets read out multiple poems which with the extended number of poets competing meant that if you were one of the last few poets to perform you may have felt a bit pressed for time. This didn't seem to deter the host from reading out quite a few of his own poems which I thought could have been avoided. But that really is a very small criticism for the night.

All in all the energy and vibe of the audience and performers was really warm and engaging. This is definitely an event to check out and be a part of.

The poetry slams are held every month and encourages new artists to compete. There is also an option to come up and read as part of an open mic while the judges are collating their results and picking the winners. English and Hindi performers are judged separately and win separately.

Keep an eye out on The Big Mic Facebook page for updates on other events as well.