AAW #146

It might not be so easy to get change for a Rs 2000 note in the market today. If this is an annoying situation, then imagine the plight of people in Saurashtra and some areas of Ahmedabad who are having trouble explaining to 20% of vendors that Rs 10 coins are legally accepted. While such difficulties are part and parcel of daily life, for everything else, there is the power of prayer, which helps us to recover from the blows. Prayers are essentially poems and literary verses written by authors who wanted to inspire people through their words. You can taste a flavour of this at the Sufi & Mystic Music Festival this week in Ahmedabad.

Literature, art, theatre and creativity have left no soul untouched. Through Ahmedabad Art Weekly, we are highlighting those people of Ahmedabad who are relentlessly creating enriching experiences for the city’s denizens. And this week is no different. Some diverse and wondrous events happening across the city this week.

The inspiration behind the 146th Ahmedabad Art Weekly is Indian-American Bharatnatyam dancer and mentor Medha Yodh. Born in the heritage city of Ahmedabad in 1927, Yodh became a proficient dancer under the tutelage of Tanjore Balasaraswati. During her tours abroad in her younger days, she became highly inspired by global dance forms. She was a tutor at the University of California, where she passed on her Guru’s teachings to other aspirants. As an exponent of the performing arts, she developed a documentary on the traditional Gujarati dance form of Garba, called Garba-Ras: A Glimpse into Gujarati Culture.