The 7th edition of the three-day ‘Kathakar: International Storytellers Festival’ was inaugurated by Minister of State (MoS) for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA), New Delhi on 1 December 2017.
Kathakar is the only oral storytelling festival in India and is a part of Ghummakkad Narain- the Travelling Literature Festival which was started under the aegis of UNESCO in 2010.The festival is an attempt to not just preserve the art form but also create new audiences for the same.
The partners for this year’s festival are IGNCA of Union Ministry of Culture in Delhi, Heritage Transport Museum, Gurugram and National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA), Mumbai.
Key Highlights
• The festival will have a circus act for the first time, performed by children from the slums trained by Sweedish Circus master Andreo.
• There will also be stories of Deendayal Upadhyay and Nanaji Deshmukh, celebrated by the Government of India.
• The festival will also see Vishal Bharadwaj and Mohit Chauhan come together for the first time to share folk stories through music.
• It will also have two puppeteers from Italy and Andhra Pradesh, who are not just master of their work but also the last ones promoting and practicing the art form.
• The highlight of the inaugural session was the launch of the book 'Curious Tales from the Himalayas' co-authored by Shaguna Gahilote and Prarthana Gahilote.
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Kathakar Festival
• Kathakar is a special initiative, to promote the oral storytelling tradition which has existed across the world.
• It is part of bigger initiative Ghummakkad Narain- the Travelling Literature Festival which was started under aegis of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 2010.
• It is only oral storytelling festival in India. It not only aims to preserve the art form but also create new audiences for same.
• Though performance storytelling has seen a revival in Europe, in India, only few efforts have been made to contemporise the art form.
• The festival this year will be hosted by the cities of Delhi, Gurugram, Noida and Mumbai.
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