Lost in the lanes of Girgaum

The micro-histories explored in this exhibition uphold a community's engagement with the Indian nationalist movement

If you, like this writer, enjoy getting lost in time and antiquity, there's no better place to start with than Khotachi Wadi. The 47-a design gallery tucked in the bylanes of the heritage village facilitates such intentional wanderings. A recently concluded exhibition titled This Ground, Plus: Khotachi Wadi in Design Context, familiarised people with architectural styles, tangible culture and material memory from a bygone era; it also spoke about niche people-centric histories. Some of these people stories that bring Vanguard Studios and Famous Physical Culture Home to the fore were curated by city chronicling platform Miss Bombaywalla.

The physical culture home or gymnasium at Parekh Street, established in 1940 comprised 900-strong members who played a crucial role as an evacuation force, guiding nationalist leaders, agitators and volunteers from the hotbeds of activity to safety, before they could fall to police custody during India’s independence movement. About their growing relevance, gallery co-director Mortimer Chatterjee said, "These photo series work on two different levels. The first level is of course the visual aesthetic that Philippe Calia's lens deftly captures, but apart from that, they also preserve and re-tell stories that, if not, would have been lost. They are micro-histories hidden from our view; they don't make headlines. For the culture home, we were interested in the bit about gymnasts doubling up as security guards for nationalist leaders, and how that comes together to give us a larger picture of the time."

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