NEWS: GemArts Masala Festival

Image: Narivad (Feminism in Sanskrit), talk with artists Sofia Barton and Lady Kitt

Dynamic local organisation GemArts shine a light on South Asian culture through diverse programming of exciting performance and participatory projects, often collaborating with promoters and venues like Sage Gateshead and Newcastle Festival of Jazz & Improvised Music to bring thrilling performers to the region.

This year’s Masala Festival, their annual celebration of South Asian arts and culture, fuses in person and online events in a programme which includes international collaborations, award-winning poets, new commissions, workshops, talks and incredible music, dance and visual arts spanning traditional and contemporary genres.

Running from Saturday 17^th-Sunday 25^th July, highlights include their opening event at Alphabetti entitled Bor(neo): North + East, a spoken word investigation into themes around identity, marginalisation and dualism in an exciting collaboration between poets from Borneo and Northern England (Saturday 17^th); Narivad (Feminism in Sanskrit) promises to be a fascinating online artist talk with Sofia Barton and Lady Kitt, who discuss the Indian suffragettes who helped shaped feminism (Monday 19^th); also online, award-winning poet and dancer Tishani Doshi reads from her new poetry collection A God At The Door and chats with author John Challis about her work (Tuesday 20^th); Tattoo Stories is an engrossing podcast about tattooing and the stories and history of body art by Vimal Korpal, which launches on Wednesday 21^st; the unique piano and tabla collaboration of Helen Anahita Wilson and Shahbaz Hussain visits The Lit & Phil for what promises to be a special performance (Friday 23^rd); and there’s more music at The Globe when award-winning sitarist Jasdeep Singh Degun brings his unique energy and vision to Indian classical and contemporary music (Sunday 25^th) as part of the venue’s Summer Festival.

GemArts’ Masala Festival takes place from Saturday 17^th-Sunday 25^th July at various venues and online