3rd Chandigarh Arts and Heritage Festival opens today

Chandigarh, Sanjay Pahwa:

 India’s vibrant culture took centre stage as a highlight of opening of 3rd Chandigarh Arts and Heritage Festival today. The much-cherished 3rd Chandigarh Arts and Heritage festival unveiled today with a brilliant live performance by 300 artists from all across the country. The five day long cultural bonanza was inaugurated by Sh M.P.Singh Secretary to Governor in the presence of senior officials of the Chandigarh Administration.

The festival added a new flavor in the heavily crowded Sector `17 Plaza in the evening through its unique progamme titled Indradhanush-celebrating the Diversity of India” in which the tribal and folk dance of India was arranged by NZCC and Chandigarh Administration. This vivacious colourful performance by the NZCC artists was held at Sector 17 today . As many as 300 accomplished folk dancers drawn from different states of India brought a live the diverse regional cultural of the regions in the cultural extravaganza. The event marked the opening of 3rd Chandigarh Arts and Heritage Festival. The folk dancers presented a spell binding choreographic dance medley performance representing different cultural regional zones of the country.

In the beginning, Prologue, a folk instrument piece opened the show followed by dances which were beautifully choreographed to enthral the Public at large .The different dancing form of Art were tribal dance Jabro from Jammu & Kashmir, Ghasiari (tribal dance of Uttrakhand), Bihu (folk dance of Assam),Garba Raas(traditional dance Gujrat), Kalbelia (Rajasthan), Cheraw(Mizorom),Mewari (Gujrat), Pungcholam ad Pholcholum from Manipur, Bhag (Haryana),Chhau dance(Jharkhand).Thangia(Manipur),Myoor(Uttarpradesh), Sambalpuri Orissa), Bhangra(Punjab),Siddigoma(Gujrat).This grand finale evening concluded with a live performance by Gurmeet bawa.

A ninety minutes show was so aesthetical and brought the diversity, cultural, heritage of India on one common platform. The traditional costume worn by the artists of their respective states made the performance vibrant and lively. The traditional folk instruments used had reverberated the ambiance. A unique stage was set up by the Chandigarh Administration for this event was unusual in its own with a three tier stage. These folk dances were creative work with the artistic steps and postures accompanied by the rhythmical movements of vocal and instrumental music.

In addition to this, an art workshop organized by Chandigarh Lalit Kala Akademi and led by celebrated artist Atul Dodiya with ten young Chandigarh artists opened at 4pm with city artists painting a common canvas and Dodiya announcing that he would be making sketches in his sketch book, painting water colours and see portfolios of other artists. The workshop will be open everyday from 1 pm to 6 pm till 30th March at Government Museum and Art Gallery Sector 10. Tomorrow, there will be a live performance by Sarod Vadan Ustad Amjad Ali Khan at 6.30 pm at Tagore Theatre.