Kolkata’s romance with art and culture is not unknown and that came to life in a contemporary manner with the Kolkata Arts Lane festival on the 12th of January. The one day festival in Hindustan Park was curated by 24 year old Devanshi Rungta of ‘Art Rickshaw’. ‘Art Rickshaw’ started by Devanshi aims to spread awareness about art in a fun way with workshops for kids and adults.
The Kolkata Arts Lane festival was meant to bring the city together for a walk in carnival on a street that was filled with fun, laughter, music, food, coffee and games. There were stalls put up on either sides of the roads, the roads were painted and beautiful wall graffiti’s turned heads everywhere.
Why People Loved The Kolkata Arts Lane Festival:
Swati Agarwal a visitor who had visited the place was impressed after coming here for the 3rd year. She says that art and culture gets a new face and such events can be enjoyed by one and all across different ages. Apart from art, people can also visit different stalls and buy food, cookies and brownies and at the same time they can even choose to sit down in one of the cafes that had their stalls like Artsy Café, and Sienna Café. “I think it is a brilliant thing that Art Rickshaw has come up with and with every passing year it is gaining popularity. People are loving this art festival.” Says Swati Poddar who absolutely loved watching the paintings and munching on snacks at the stalls.
“There is a lot of culture and heritage which we tend to forgo in our everyday lives, but this festival was a point of convergence of different things, from culinary art to artistic art and Bollywood paintings. It covered almost everything” Says Meenakshi Sircar who lived in London years ago.
Meenakshi loved the fact that Kolkata has decided to indulge in such an interesting concept like the art festival, where they had decorated an entire lane with paintings, arts and other artifact’s and a number of popular food joints were there at the venue. “These are popular in London as well, and you can find it in Hauz Khas in Delhi too. But imbibing a concept like this is pretty unique in Kolkata. This is my first time here and my daughter enjoyed it here too.” Added Meenakshi.
However she felt that traffic management could have been done in a more efficient manner and a wider space for the festival can add more enthusiasm to travel to this spot next year.
Why This Festival Only Gets More Popular:
This kind of an art festival happening in Kolkata surely has turned many heads over the past 3 years. The unique concept of the Kolkata Art Lane Festival and decorating the entire lane, devoting it for highlighting the culture and tradition of Bengal is something to be proud of. Prema Rajaram, a resident of Hindustan Park says that this is the first of it’s kind in Kolkata and lot of Innovative things brighten up this 1 day art festival. “From having paintings, interesting bright graffitis on the walls, making personalized postcards to curate stories on them to buying scarfs and accessories, there was so much to enjoy. We followed it up with munching on lip smacking food from popular food joints like Potboiler, Artsy and Sienna Cafe. I think this art lane festival really is a new and vibrant concept in the city” Says Prema.
The Kolkata Arts Lane Festival which highlights art and culture of a new age West Bengal, has surely managed to gain a lot of popularity in it’s 3rd year. People are eagerly waiting to see that what Art Rickshaw has for them next year!
