An Indian summer in Spain

Natalia Helo is acting in Jiyo: A Beggars? Opera that will be staged at the Universal Forum of Cultures in Barcelona.

If there is one place where India is certainly shining at the moment, it is Barcelona. The Universal Forum of Cultures, jointly organised by the Spanish and the Catalan government with the UN and Unesco also joining in, it is a gargantuan effort to fight poverty in the world. And the Indian connection is our very own cultural impresario, Rajeev Sethi, whose Asian Heritage Foundation has designed and developed participatory installations such as the Sky of Aspirations – a shade made from flying tensile forms covering an area of 5000 sq.m.; outreach environmental programmes like Tree of Life Microcredit Courtyard as well as a theatre production, Jiyo: A Beggars’ Opera.

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“The fact that Indians were approached to create an international project is quite a big thing in itself,” says Sethi, who was appointed as a goodwill ambassador to the Forum and his Rajeev Sethi Scenographers Pvt Ltd as the principal scenographer to conceive the Plaza. On from May 9, the Forum will see another aspect of India when theatreperson Roysten Abel lands there with his latest project, Jiyo: A Beggars’ Opera. An open-air production, this one is similar to the one he did with folk artists from Shaadipur Depot.

“The only difference is that a Colombian student comes down to India to research on death rituals and meets these people in Shaadipur Depot who perform the rituals,” says Abel. Concurs Natalia Helo, a Colombian, who is acting in the play and looking forward to being in Barcelona, “I was a Colombian actress in the last play who came looking for magicians but this time I am researching on death rituals. It has been a wonderful experience and these artistes are just amazing.”

With the Forum receiving millions of visitors, Sethi is definitely a happy man today. That gives Abel and Helo enough reasons to look forward to their performance in Barcelona.