{"id":5081,"date":"2023-01-15T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-01-15T04:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/adventure.auroville.com\/?p=5081"},"modified":"2026-04-21T14:37:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-21T10:07:11","slug":"kalabhumi-land-of-arts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/adventure.auroville.com\/index.php\/2023\/01\/15\/kalabhumi-land-of-arts\/","title":{"rendered":"Kalabhumi: Land of the Arts"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

When going out to listen to live music in Auroville, Kalabhumi Music Studio quickly comes to mind; but not everyone knows that Kalabhumi is actually the name of a wider community including the film institute Aurofilm, the nearby performing arts theatre CRIPA, and workshops for painting and sculpting. Building a centre for the arts in Auroville has been an adventure in itself, and the journey is ongoing. We spoke with Rolf and Edo about this unique community space in Auroville’s Cultural Zone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A Space for Culture<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

With Auroville’s aspirations and ideals, artistic personalities have been drawn to the township ever since its inception. However, the early years were marked by the relentless labour of battling the elements, to transform and restore the soil. With living conditions minimal, it would take time for the infrastructure to come about to allow Aurovilians to express their artistic gifts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the 1980’s, Pondicherry was home to an underground music scene involving expats from France, Sri Aurobindo Ashram youth and travelers. At the time, the main practice space for Auroville musicians was a non sound-proofed room at Bharat Nivas. As Auroville life was becoming more established and certain, many began hoping that beyond a spiritual community focused on Sri Aurobindo’s ideas, Auroville could emerge as a cultural centre as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multidisciplinary artist Rolf Lieser was active in Germany’s art scene in the 70’s before coming to Auroville, where he organised cultural events as well as teaching art at Last School. He remembers internationally renowned trumpeter Markus Stockhausen coming to Auroville on tour in the 80’s, and sometime in the early 90s, a huge multimedia show organised at the Bharat Nivas auditorium in the week leading up to New Year’s eve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Rolf’s caretaker house, Kalabhumi community, 1994<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

In that week, artists from different disciplines, such as painters, sculptors, musicians and theatre performers, created an event where stage and audience spaces were reversed – a magnificent light show in a hall filled with sculptures, paintings and upcycled materials, with the audience sitting on stage amidst the installations. One Aurovilian went so far as to compare that performance’s spectacular quality to that of a Pink Floyd concert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, Auroville already had a designated Cultural Zone<\/a>, but no clear plans for its development. Having worked for a decade in Auroville’s youth community Ami, and inspired by the kind of interdisciplinary multimedia art expression seen in the Bharat Nivas show, Rolf proposed a centre for the arts in the Cultural Zone, to be called Kalabhumi – meaning “Land of Arts” in both Tamil and Sanskrit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The layout, approved in 1994 by the Planning and Development group, involved a set of art studios beside the future crown road, with a line of caretaker homes in the back. Rolf soon moved into his new home, and began welcoming other artists while setting up water, phone and electricity infrastructure on this previously uninhabited land.<\/p>\n\n\n\n