November 15, 2025
01:30 PM - 02:30 PM
Aditya Birla Auditorium | On-Site
In the heart of Bombay’s cultural renaissance, the Bhulabhai Desai Memorial Institute (BDMI) stood as a living experiment in artistic cross-pollination. It was here that the modern Indian art movement took root, where Gaitonde, Husain, Padamsee, and Nasreen Mohamedi painted in neighboring studios, where Gallery 59 showcased the Bombay Progressives, and where artists worked not in isolation but in dialogue with dancers, musicians, and theatre-makers. BDMI nurtured an ecosystem defined by permeability, trust, and creative generosity. This panel with creative practitioners, reflects on that legacy to ask: What might a 21st-century Bhulabhai look like? In a world shaped by rising costs, digital dissemination, and institutional gatekeeping, how can artists and cultural practitioners reimagine spaces of shared production and collaboration? What enables radical experimentation across disciplines and generations? And how can such a legacy be carried forward as a model for the future? This event is supported by Avid Learning.
Anahita Uberoi is an actor, director, and producer who has worked across New York, Mumbai, and Germany for over three decades. Trained at the Herbert Berghof Studio in New York, she has assisted on numerous Broadway and international productions, including working with her mother, Padmashree Vijaya Mehta, on Naga Mandala in Germany. Anahita has performed in and directed over thirty acclaimed plays and conducted theatre workshops across India. She also served as Creative Consultant at BookMyShow and as Creative Learning Director for Connections India, a youth theatre festival with the UK’s National Theatre.
Owais Husain’s work explores identity, memory, and evolving urban mythology, reinterpreting traditional Indian aesthetics through contemporary forms. His series To Speak is to Disappear (2009) features ink drawings of figures struggling to connect, while Sympathy vs. Empathy (2014) depicts a masked boy and a hidden tiger in a reflection on identity. In multimedia installations like Heart of Silence (2015) and My Body, A Fleet of Ships (2014), Husain combines film, sculpture, poetry, and painting to create layered, poetic meditations on selfhood and transformation.
Ranjit Hoskote is a poet, cultural theorist, and independent curator. His poetry collections include Central Time (2014), Jonahwhale (2018), Hunchprose (2021), and Icelight (2023). He curated India’s first national pavilion at the Venice Biennale (2011) and co-curated the 7th Gwangju Biennale. A fellow of several international programs, he has also served on the Venice Biennale Jury (2015). Hoskote sits on advisory boards including the Public Arts Trust of India and the Murty Classical Library of India and was an inaugural Georgetown Global Dialogues Fellow (2024).
Reema Desai Gehi is the Editor of ART India. She has previously written for the Mumbai Mirror, The Times of India, Hindustan Times and India Today. An alumna of Cardiff University (UK), Reema completed her Master’s with a special focus on arts journalism. In 2024, she authored her debut book, The Catalyst: Rudolf von Leyden and India's Artistic Awakening, which was published in English by Speaking Tiger. The book was translated into German and published by Draupadi Verlag.
