Arts Collaboratory

Through its International Residency and Associate Residency Programs KHOJ seeks to promote collaborative exchanges among the artistic community both practically and aesthetically. The programming attempts to seed collaboration, new modes of practice and representation with a particular focus on bringing in new audiences. In an attempt to connect with the larger public and minority groups, KHOJ organises a sustained Community-Based Art Programme which sometimes fall under the broader umbrella of the Associate Residency Program. By directly participating with and engaging their audiences, artists-in-residence can act as facilitators to enrich and change the communities in which they work demonstrating that community-based art and artists can transform communities with diverse populations.

Ghoomakkad Toli – A Community Theatre Project at Khirkee Village

In the Summer of 2009, Mrinmoyee Majumdar, a performer and arts-based therapist based in Delhi, led a community-based arts project titled Ghoomakkad Toli where she worked with children to create and document their memories of group play. The essential aim of the project was to make a body of site-specific performance work that would acknowledge the physical surroundings and the children’s relationship with these spaces at a particular time.

The premise for the Ghummakad Toli project was to look at ordinary spaces in the community that take on special meanings for the local children. It aimed at re-creating previously told stories and created new ones with the children through a drama workshop that involved story circles, script-writing and body-work. The stories then were played as site-specific performances.

Throughout the duration of the Ghoomakkad Toli project, the artist and the participating children took walks in Khirkee, played in the park, created a story in the Khirkee Masjid, painted, and worked on short skits. According to the artist, the space the children really enjoyed working in was in the Khoj Studio! Unlike at all the public spaces, the studio offered them a sense of “safety” in which they could openly create and play with their stories.

All the members brought different talents into the toli. Some children had grown up playing percussions as part of their family trade, there were others who really enjoyed drawing and painting, while there were others who loved to dance and sing. During the project the participants were comfortable sharing these different skills with each other and interacting with the entire group without the usual baggage of caste or class. They learned to accept each other’s differences and find common ground which was in the artist opinion “the most exciting ‘by-product’ of doing theatre with the Khirkee community”.