This year's month-long Edinburgh Festival, which is often termed as the world's biggest festival for art and culture, will feature many Indian artists, including Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan. Jonathan Mills, the director of the , speaks on his reasons for focusing on India and the rest of Asia
This year's month-long Edinburgh Festival, which is often termed as the world's biggest festival for art and culture, will feature many Indian artists, including Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan. Jonathan Mills, the director of the , speaks on his reasons for focusing on India and the rest of Asia
What is different about this year's festival?
This year, we are focusing on the art and culture of Asia. But we are not being folkloric about it and instead looking at Europe's relationship with Asia. Thus, there will be a young Korean company performing Shakespeare's The Tempest, and another from Taipei performing King Lear. There is also a Chinese opera of Hamlet. All of these are very Asian, yet also European.
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Why this focus on Asia?
Festivals are purveyors of ideas. An opera piece or dance performance is an idea that reflects the thoughts, preoccupations and visions of a particular time. So irrespective of what brochures tell about me, my job is essentially to sniff the air. And what I can say confidently is that the wind is blowing towards the East.
What did you have in mind when you invited Pandit Ravi Shankar and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan to perform at the festival?
In their cases, I wanted to take the ragas, something unique and special to India and use it to transform our experiences with our own concerts. While our music can be performed anytime of the day, it is not the same with ragas. A morning raga does not sound correct when performed in the evening. It will be like eating breakfast at midnight. So Khan will perform the morning ragas and Pandit Shankar, the evening ones. Pandit Shankar's will be special. It will be an old man at the end of his career giving a summary of the evening as well as, in a way, his career.
Are we going to see more Indian culture featured in Edinburgh?
There were many musicians and performers from India whom we cannot feature this year, because of limited space. But they will, hopefully, perform in the future. I know that for a long time many cultures have remained peripheral, but now they will become more central in the festival.
Many think you have brought about internationalism in the festival.
For many years, the festival was preoccupied with Europe because it was a result of the mindset at the end of the Second World War. (The Edinburgh Festival started in 1947.) Europe had to build itself. So it is obvious that art and culture in Europe would have a moment of self-absorption and self-reflection.u00a0 But over the years, a lot has changed. I have tried to bring about a slight reorientation of the festival, where the festival would be European but also capable of absorbing influences and relationships from abroad.
How are people in Europe reacting to your reorientation of the festival?
This focus on Asia is in a way an acknowledgement that we live in a globalised world, a world where Europe's role has diminished. It is not that Europe is less important, but that other places are more important. But because Europe has been so used to being the centre of everything, many cannot imagine such a world. So they ask, if we are not the centre, what is the centre, when they should be asking if there is a centre at all.
What is your opinion on Indian art?
One cannot generalise and speak about an Indian art scene. While there may be a particular dance scene in Bangalore, another pocket of the country will have a rich textile practice. It is just too rich and diverse.
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