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Bengal Biennale returns: 2nd edition to spread across Kolkata and Santiniketan
Bengal Biennale returns: 2nd edition to spread across Kolkata and Santiniketan
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New Delhi, Noted poet Jibananda Das' 1942 poem "Banalata Sen" finds new life as the curatorial framework and theme for the upcoming second edition of Bengal Biennale, which references both the central figure of the poem and the ecology of wild forest vines , delving into subterranean worlds and buried histories across Kolkata and Santiniketan.
The art exhibition, scheduled to be organised by the Gameplan Foundation from November 15 to January 2, 2027, will aim to bring art into dialogue with the layered histories, landscapes and cultural geographies of Bengal and beyond.
Co-curated by artist collective Chander Haat and curator Ritika Biswas, the biennale will "bring together collective and individual approaches to artistic practice, research, and community-building, while foregrounding the specific cultural and ecological contexts of Bengal".
"I envision the second Bengal Biennale as a slightly strange, slightly dissonant, slightly dark ecology which embraces the full spectrum of being alive in and to a burning world. Banalata foregrounds emotion, rest, and poetics, as modes through which we might critically examine the systems and selves within which we are entangled.
"It endeavours to create new knottings of kinship and solidarity across Bengal and beyond. This Biennale attempts to hold poetics and politics as inherently and generatively entwined forces," Biswas said in a statement.
While the list of participating artists is yet to be announced, the exhibition will unfold across multiple venues in Kolkata and Santiniketan, connecting established cultural institutions, historic sites, artist-led spaces and alternative locations.
"Banalata" will move through a variety of sites including a former prison, old houses, a wild park among others in Kolkata and Santiniketan.
Some of the venues for the biennale include Nandan Art Museum & Gallery, Tokaroun, Santiniketan Society of Visual Art & Design, Arthshila, Sculpture Park, Somnath Hore Studio and Krittika Arts Space in Santiniketan, and The Alipore Museum, The Indian Museum, TRI Art & Culture, Lalit Kala Akademi, The Red Bari, The Dockyard Co, and the Kolkata Centre for Creativity in Kolkata.
"The more polarised our world seems, the more urgent is the need to acknowledge the lessons of resilience that nature offers us. If we wish to learn from it. The unseen entanglements that unite us, the neurons that make us feel for each other, and the hope that green shoots hold out to us - Bengal Biennale's Banalata was born, and grew from these thoughts," Jeet and Malavika Banerjee, trustees, Gameplan Foundation said.
The inaugural edition in 2024 was held across more than 25 venues in Kolkata and Santiniketan, and featured over a hundred artists.
This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
