10 years of Serendipity: The arts festival hosts a mini edition in Birmingham

At the Bradshaw Hall—Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, you can see black-and-white photographs of Ustad Zakir Hussain lining the exhibition space. These hail from Dayanita Singh’s Zakir Hussain Maquette and form a tribute to the late maestro, who passed away last year. This show also looks at the artist’s early engagement with the form of the book and the ways in which she extended it to a handmade maquette 1986 onwards. The exhibition features exquisite candid images of Hussain alongside enlarged pages of handwritten interviews. The Zakir Hussain Maquette is part of a micro edition being organised by the Serendipity Arts Festival in the city of Birmingham, UK, till 26 May. This showcase kickstarts the 10-year anniversary celebration of the interdisciplinary festival, which will unfold across ten cities globally in the course of the year.

At Birmingham, music seems to form the core of the micro edition with exhibitions, talks, performances and film screenings offering a nuanced understanding of different forms and styles such as the fado, Jazz from both India and Americas, folk music, ghazals and Hindi film music. Especially interesting is a showcase of Portuguese-Goan music by Zubin Balaporia and Nadia Rebelo, and Thumri in the Chamber, a reimagined presentation of the classical Indian vocal form. “It invites audiences to experience thumri not only as a musical form, but as a cultural prism—one through which diverse artistic, historical, and social dimensions are refracted and revealed, offering a fresh and immersive perspective on one of Hindustani music’s most cherished traditions,” states the curatorial note. This is being reflected through discussions and artistic interventions across the festival. There is also a pop-up library on the history of Indian instruments curated by the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire.

Hussain’s genius is being celebrated not just through Singh’s photographs but through film and interactions as well. According to Smriti Rajgarhia, director, Serendipity Arts Foundation and Festival, Remembering Zakir Hussain is a two-part tribute to the maestro. It includes a special screening of the film, The Speaking Hand, followed by a conversation between director Sumantra Ghosal and Dharmesh Rajput of Birmingham City University, which is the partner for the mini edition. The film traces the rise from the bylanes of Mumbai to global fame. The tribute also includes participatory workshops like the Art of Taal, presenting a confluence of drum and tabla, and Scoring to Picture that delves into the art of composing music for a film.

Also read: Serendipity Arts Festival 2024: A future-forward event that is rooted in Goa

One wonders about the choice of Birmingham to start the milestone celebrations for the festival. According to Rajgarhia, the city represented a confluence of vibrant communities, a dynamic public culture, and a thriving creative ecosystem. “Birmingham is bustling with annual festivals of jazz, comedy, poetry, film, and literature. It is also home to a notable artistic legacy — from the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Birmingham Royal Ballet, the Royal Shakespeare Company and iconic cultural venues like the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire and Symphony Hall, to the region’s great galleries like the Barber Institute, the Ikon Gallery, and the New Art Gallery Walsall,” she elaborates. Further, the city has come into the pop culture spotlight with shows like Peaky Blinders. This ever-evolving creative landscape made it conducive to host the first mini edition of Serendipity Arts Festival there. She feels that Birmingham, with its large South Asian diasporic community, provides a blueprint for experimentation with the idea of taking the arts across borders.

For years now, the annual Serendipity Arts Festival, held across Panjim, has been rooted in the architecture and culture of the city. With every city having its own cultural fabric, how does the team plan to replicate that element going forward this year?  “Now that we kickstart with SAF’s Mini Edition in Birmingham, we hope that the community here will respond to a living tapestry of art, music, and cultural narratives that bridge the East to the West,” says Rajgarhia. “As in Goa, where we activate public spaces with our Festival, in Birmingham too we have iconic venues like the Symphony Hall and the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire to encourage the public’s engagement with art.”

Also read: ‘Mumbai Star’: A musical play that tries to rise above the cliches