Serendipity Arts Foundation, India is collaborating with HarperCollins Publishers India to promote writing in the arts from South Asia

Serendipity Arts Foundation, India is collaborating with HarperCollins Publishers India to promote writing in the arts from South Asia

The two entities come together for the first time to release a series of independent essays from Serendipity Arts Festival titled ‘Projects / Processes’

October 21, 2019: Serendipity Arts Foundation, India is associating with HarperCollins Publishers India, one of the world’s largest publishing companies, to release a series of long-form essays about select projects from the 2018 edition of Serendipity Arts Festival, one of India’s biggest multi-disciplinary arts initiatives, under the series title ‘Projects / Processes’.

Serendipity Arts Foundation, founded in 2014 by Sunil Kant Munjal, is an initiative to encourage creativity from the South Asia region to thrive and find a voice – in all its forms, transcending socio-cultural and economic barriers. The foundation has multiple initiatives throughout the year, including residencies, grants and its flagship multi-disciplinary arts initiative the Serendipity Arts Festival. In 2017, the foundation started chronicling and publishing its various projects through commissioned research essays, long-form writing, and in-depth criticism exploring the ideas and processes behind select curatorial projects at Serendipity Arts Festival. The research work, done independently by the foundation, culminated in a series of essays called ‘Projects / Processes’.

In order support and promote art and writing in the arts, the foundation has joined hands with HarperCollins Publishers India, who will publish and distribute the series across the world.

On the occasion, Ms. Smriti Rajgarhia, Director, Serendipity Arts Foundation, said, “Projects/Processes are an integral part of the Festival, supporting art writing which is informed by research and dialogue. The essays lend critical perspectives to projects showcased at Serendipity, and are a step towards making art criticism diverse and accessible. We are very proud to be associated with HarperDesign, the exciting new imprint dedicated to art and design by HarperCollins India, and look forward to taking Projects/Processes to new audiences.”

The forthcoming series, exploring projects that took place during Serendipity Arts Festival 2018, comprises 5 volumes, offering an opportunity to give some of these works and the stories they tell a continued life, through a deeply engaged look at how they came together and their significance to the discourse of contemporary art in India.

The five volumes are titled The Personal is Political: Photo, Film & Performance Archives; Experiments in Performing Art; Continued Traditions & Histories of Performing Art; Explorations of the Contemporary; and Other Everydays. Each book comprises essays covering distinct projects that resonate with each other, through the questions they raise and the thematic landscape they cover. Writers include — Akhila Vimal C., Amitava Sanyal, Bharathy Singaravel, Kamayani Sharma, Maya Palit, Meenakshi Thirukode, Mila Samdub, Rahaab Allana, Ranjana Dave, Rose Merin, Sabeena Gadihoke, Senjuti Mukherjee, Skye Arundhati Thomas, Trina Nileena Banerjee and Vivek Menezes.

Speaking about the collaboration, Bonita Vaz-Shimray, Publisher HarperDesign, HarperCollins India said, “Serendipity Arts Foundation has done the incredible by making art accessible to all; their festival in Goa every year has been a huge success among both the local community and visitors. The curatorial process and exhibition themes are meticulously executed and documented through the year and we are happy to collaborate with their team to bring these books to a larger audience. Insights into the process and conversations with the artists will make the general viewer aware and connect with art in a deeper and more meaningful way. We are excited to publish this into our brand new HarperDesign imprint dedicated to art and design books.”

About SERENDIPITY ARTS FOUNDATION

Serendipity Arts Foundation is an organization that facilitates pluralistic cultural expressions, sparking conversations around the arts across the South Asia region. Committed to innovation and creativity, the aim of the foundation is to support practice and research in the arts, as well as to promote sustainability and education in the field through a range of cultural and collaborative initiatives. The foundation hosts projects throughout the year, which include institutional partnerships with artists and art organizations, educational initiatives, grants and outreach programmes across India.

About SERENDIPITY ARTS FESTIVAL

Serendipity Arts Festival (SAF) is one of the largest multi-disciplinary art initiatives in the South Asia region. It spans the visual, performing and culinary arts, whilst exploring genres with film, live arts, literature and fashion. Besides the core content, which is conceptualized by an eminent curatorial panel, the Festival has various layers of programming, in the form of educational initiatives, workshops, special projects, and institutional engagements. Through active conversations between the artistic community and the urban, social landscape, the festival continues to evolve around the mandate of making art visible and accessible. The festival seeks collaborations at its core, inspiring new perspectives of seeing and experiencing. The festival is a cultural experiment that also addresses issues such as arts education, patronage culture, interdisciplinary discourse, inclusivity and accessibility of the arts. The fourth edition of Serendipity Arts Festival will take place in Panaji, Goa from 15 to 22 December 2019.

About HARPERCOLLINS PUBLISHERS INDIA

HarperCollins Publishers India is a subsidiary of HarperCollins Publishers. HarperCollins Publishers India publishes some of the finest writers from the Indian Subcontinent and around the world, publishing approximately 200 new books every year, with a print and digital catalogue of more than 2,000 titles across 10 imprints. Its authors have won almost every major literary award including the Man Booker Prize, the DSC Prize, the New India Foundation Award, the Atta Galatta Prize, the Shakti Bhatt Prize, the Publishing Next Award, the Sahitya Akademi Award and the Crossword Book Award. HarperCollins Publishers India also represents some of the finest publishers in the world including Oneworld, Bonnier Zaffre, Usborne, Dover and Lonely Planet. HarperCollins Publishers India is also the only publisher to have been awarded the Publisher of the Year Award three times: at Publishing Next in 2015, and at Tata Literature Live! in 2016 and 2018.

Please send any enquires to Akriti Tyagi, HarperCollins India: Akriti.Tyagi@harpercollins.co.in