The Kabir Project
The Kabir project brings together the experiences of a series of ongoing journeys in quest of this 15th century North Indian mystic poet in our contemporary worlds. Started in 2003, these journeys inquire into the spiritual and socio-political resonances of Kabir’s poetry through songs, images and conversations.
We journey through a stunning diversity of social, religious and musical traditions which Kabir inhabits, exploring how his poetry intersects with ideas of cultural identity, secularism, nationalism, religion, death, impermanence, folk and oral knowledge systems. The core inspiration of the project is music, and Kabir comes alive in 4 documentary films, 10 audio CDs and poetry books through the power of song.
This is an initiative undertaken by filmmaker Shabnam Virmani as an artist-in-residency project at the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology in Bangalore, India. The project is supported by the Ford Foundation, New Delhi and Wipro, Bangalore.
Apart from the films, CDs and books, the true spirit of the Kabir Project lies in the taana-baana (warp & weft) of social networks and friendships built over these years between the singers, scholars, activists, artists, illustrators, students, music lovers and lay persons who have been woven together through student labs, festivals, workshops and other exchanges. Folk singers Prahlad Tipanya, Mukhtiyar Ali and others have become deep friends, giving the project its soul force. Our advisors include scholars Linda Hess and Purushottam Agrawal, poet Ashok Vajpeyi, singer Vidya Rao, and ethnomusicologist Shubha Chaudhuri.
The project is growing rapidly in many ways, with cultural groups, educational, social and community-based institutions and individuals taking the initiative to organize workshops and interactive events that include the films, folk singers, live music concerts and discussions.
In the next phase of the project, work has begun towards constructing a multi-media web-space to browse the music, poetry and ideas of Kabir. This web-space will be co-created with the involvement of folk singers, along with innovative social experiments to vitalize the Kabir oral traditions at the village level. Exploratory workshops and school-based interactions have begun to explore ways in which the power of Kabir’s poetry can be brought alive in education.
http://www.kabirproject.org/about us
The Kabir project brings together the experiences of a series of ongoing journeys in quest of this 15th century North Indian mystic poet in our contemporary worlds. Started in 2003, these journeys inquire into the spiritual and socio-political resonances of Kabir’s poetry through songs, images and conversations.
We journey through a stunning diversity of social, religious and musical traditions which Kabir inhabits, exploring how his poetry intersects with ideas of cultural identity, secularism, nationalism, religion, death, impermanence, folk and oral knowledge systems. The core inspiration of the project is music, and Kabir comes alive in 4 documentary films, 10 audio CDs and poetry books through the power of song.
This is an initiative undertaken by filmmaker Shabnam Virmani as an artist-in-residency project at the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology in Bangalore, India. The project is supported by the Ford Foundation, New Delhi and Wipro, Bangalore.
Apart from the films, CDs and books, the true spirit of the Kabir Project lies in the taana-baana (warp & weft) of social networks and friendships built over these years between the singers, scholars, activists, artists, illustrators, students, music lovers and lay persons who have been woven together through student labs, festivals, workshops and other exchanges. Folk singers Prahlad Tipanya, Mukhtiyar Ali and others have become deep friends, giving the project its soul force. Our advisors include scholars Linda Hess and Purushottam Agrawal, poet Ashok Vajpeyi, singer Vidya Rao, and ethnomusicologist Shubha Chaudhuri.
The project is growing rapidly in many ways, with cultural groups, educational, social and community-based institutions and individuals taking the initiative to organize workshops and interactive events that include the films, folk singers, live music concerts and discussions.
In the next phase of the project, work has begun towards constructing a multi-media web-space to browse the music, poetry and ideas of Kabir. This web-space will be co-created with the involvement of folk singers, along with innovative social experiments to vitalize the Kabir oral traditions at the village level. Exploratory workshops and school-based interactions have begun to explore ways in which the power of Kabir’s poetry can be brought alive in education.
http://www.kabirproject.org/about us
