February 2004, Ahmedabad – The Aakansha Arts Festival 2004 just concluded in Ahmedabad. Organised jointly by The Aakansha Trust & The Kanoria Arts Centre, the festival brought all forms of art together. The objective was a collective arts festival for the purpose of welfare of underprivileged children and women. The festival, which was from January 31st to February 2nd, was a confluence of all the arts ranging from art and painting, calligraphy, music, dance and theatre. The three days of the festival saw numerous exhibitions, creative workshops, lectures and presentations as well as music, drama & dance performances.

Some of the art workshops were

• Calligraphy – The aesthetics of beautiful writing - Amit Kharsani
• Natural Dyes – Painting on canvas using natural dyes from fruits, vegetables and herbs – Toofan Rafai
• Recycle the Home Truths – Picking up unwanted and discarded objects around the house and building meaningful sculptures from them – Khanjan Dalal
• Painting with Light – Photography – PM Dalwadi
• Paper Craft – Paper sculptures – Naranbhai Patel

Some of the exhibitions – § Art square – Artefacts by Kanoria artists and students

• Pichchwai Paintings
• Hemantji Chitrakar
• Ghanshyamji Sharma
• Kanaiyalalji – Nathdwara artists exhibition, curated by Gagan Dadhich
• Exhibition of works by artists participating in the workshops

During the festival there were also on campus workshops on pottery, terracotta sculptures and appliqué work.The festival, which brought together all art forms, was a bustling fun filled affair mixed with serious work and was very well attended. Lectures by noted artist Manjt Bawa, theatre and cinema personality Amol Palekar and artist Dhruva Mistry were some of the highlights.