30 July,2026 08:26 AM IST | Mumbai | Team mid-day
Pic/Sayyed Sameer Abedi
Policemen take a breather at the Amar Jawan Memorial at Azad Maidan
Vivek Radhakrishnan and Namu Kini
Can a city have enough art galleries? This diarist doesn't think so. Courtesy Namu Kini and Vivek Radhakrishnan, Mumbai's art scene is getting another boost with Bengaluru-based KYNKYNY Art Gallery setting up its first outpost in the city at Horniman Circle, Fort, on August 7, marking its first expansion outside Bengaluru. Founded in 2004, the art gallery has for two decades, been working with both emerging and established Indian artists. Its arrival in the city adds yet another contemporary art space to Fort's growing cultural district, with the inaugural exhibition set to be unveiled at the launch.
(From left) Ashvin E. Rajagopalan; Priyanjoli Basu; Vikramaditya Rathi
The third edition of Contemporary Now will return to Chennai on August 8, with the Mumbai quartet of Chemould Prescott Road, Project 88, Chatterjee & Lal, and TARQ, who will join Ashvita's, Experimenter, and Vadehra Art Gallery to platform a curatorial presentation, Practices in Continuum: Tracing the Present at the Lalit Kala Akademi. The exhibition "invites audiences to think more deeply," the curatorial note shared.
(Clockwise) Ravi Gaikwad, Ankur Tangade, and Sumit Kumar. Pics courtesy/Blue Material
After months of performing live, Blue Material, an all-Dalit and queer-affirmative comedy collective, will embark on its first-ever recording tour, beginning in Mumbai on August 16. The tour will next travel to Goa, Pune, Delhi, and conclude in Bengaluru on September 20. The recorded performances will be released online for the first time. "People know who we are, but not always what we do. Recording this tour will help us reach a wider audience, and we'll finally be able to put our performances online," said Ankur Tangade, co-founder of Blue Material.
As John Denver once said, "Music does bring people together. It allows us to experience the same emotions." That sentiment comes alive in Mama, a song by Esther Chungu, and the latest cross-cultural collaboration by Futures in Tune, where children from Mumbai join children from South Africa and the US in a choir that transcends language and in this case, geography.
Mumbai
Released on July 28, the video features students from The Sound Space singing in both English and Bemba, a language spoken primarily in Zambia.
Zambia
The Pedder Road-based foundation, The Sound Space, uses music to create social change through a music bus that travels across the city's bastis and community choirs. As part of Futures in Tune, children from different countries learn and perform songs from one another's cultures. Last year, participants performed Bam Bam Bole from Taare Zameen Par.
Kamakshi Khurana, Vishala Khurana and Esther Chungu
"Every year, one country shares a song and children from all the participating countries learn and perform it together. It's exciting because children from under-served communities get to connect with children from different parts of the world and exchange cultural experiences through music," said Kamakshi and Vishala Khurana, founders of The Sound Space.
