The High Com­mis­sion of the Re­pub­lic of T&T, in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the In­di­an Coun­cil for Cul­tur­al Re­la­tions (IC­CR), host­ed an art ex­hi­bi­tion en­ti­tled MI­LAP at the Azad Bha­van Art Gallery, New Del­hi, In­dia, from May 31 to June 5.

The event was joint­ly spon­sored by the Min­istry of Tourism, Min­istry of Plan­ning and Sus­tain­abil­i­ty, Gov­ern­ment of T&T and IC­CR, Gov­ern­ment of In­dia. The ex­hi­bi­tion fea­tured four artists–Tes­sa Alexan­der Sloane-Seale, who was in­vit­ed to at­tend from Trinidad, Ani­ta Chan­dra­dath Singh, BK Gu­ru and Pankaj Gu­ru who are res­i­dent in Del­hi.

This was the ini­tia­tive of T&T High Com­mis­sion­er to In­dia Chan­dra­dath Singh, who is an ad­vo­cate of pub­lic diplo­ma­cy and the use of soft pow­er through cul­ture, art and mu­sic in in­ter­na­tion­al af­fairs, and was one in a se­ries of ma­jor cul­tur­al pro­grammes or­gan­ised by the High Com­mis­sion over the past two years.

The main theme of the event was to cel­e­brate the deep cul­tur­al ties be­tween T&T and In­dia and al­so T&T's In­di­an Ar­rival Day.

Smt Chan­dresh Ku­mari Ka­toch, Min­is­ter of Cul­ture, Gov­ern­ment of In­dia, blessed the event as the chief guest at the pre­view and In­di­an Ar­rival Day cel­e­bra­tions at the Grand Ho­tel, Vas­ant Kunj, New Del­hi, and Alexan­der gave her a gift of one of her wa­ter­colours.

As the fea­tured artist, Alexan­der's dis­play of her bril­liant Caribbean colours through wa­ter colours and oil paint­ings re­flect­ed lifestyles and land­scapes of T&T and was very well re­ceived by the large au­di­ence that was in­trigued by the rep­re­sen­ta­tions of T&T's cul­ture.

Ani­ta Chan­dra­dath Singh's mas­tery, in us­ing a mix medi­um, added a rich di­men­sion to the ex­hi­bi­tion, show­cas­ing life in T&T through her im­pres­sive bronze pieces, the vi­bran­cy of T&T dance and car­ni­val in wa­ter­colour and is­land scenes through her clay mould­ing.

Both Alexan­der's and Singh's work in­cor­po­rat­ed items that high­light T&T's mul­ti-eth­nic­i­ty and were used as a back­drop for the In­di­an Ar­rival Day cel­e­bra­tions, which was or­gan­ised by the High Com­mis­sion to co­in­cide with the art ex­hi­bi­tion.

Balk­is­han Gu­ru is one of In­dia's cel­e­brat­ed bronze sculp­tors and his pieces dis­played at the ex­hi­bi­tion re­flect­ed this fact. Each item of his was the work of a mas­ter artist. Balk­is­han's fa­ther was born in T&T and is the el­der broth­er of Madan Gopal who re­cent­ly passed away in T&T. Pankaj Gu­ru, Balk­is­han's son, has al­ready cre­at­ed a name for him­self in the art world in In­dia. His dis­play was not on­ly re­fresh­ing in the tech­nique he used for his bronze sculp­tures but al­so in the deep philo­soph­i­cal ap­proach in his the­mat­ic pre­sen­ta­tion.

The event was well-re­ceived by the In­di­an pub­lic with var­i­ous stake­hold­ers at­tend­ing and ex­press­ing their de­light. The artis­tic com­mu­ni­ty was well-rep­re­sent­ed, many of whom com­ment­ed on the high lev­el at which the event was or­gan­ised in terms of the dis­play it­self and the ef­fec­tive­ness with which the rich­ness and di­ver­si­ty of T&T cul­ture were dis­played.

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