Preston Merchant

Rupa & the April Fishes at Joe's Pub

Rupa Marya and her gypsy caravan of April Fishes rolled into Joe's Pub for an eclectic evening, with the sounds of Paris cabaret, Tijuana border blues, and a braying elephant -- all performed in the boom-chick madcap style that makes Rupa and the April Fishes a great live show.

My Pet Dragon at Cameo

My friends Todd Michaelsen and Reena Shah of My Pet Dragon played at Cameo in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, with the full band -- great high-energy songs and spirited performance.

Anthony Rizzo, Todd Michaelsen & Reena Shah

Todd Michaelsen

Reena Shah

Anthony Rizzo, Todd Michaelsen, Reena Shah, Rajeev Maddela (behind cymbal), and Mario Padron

Todd Michaelsen & Reena Shah

Rajeeva Maddela

Eastie Meets Westie

Yojna (Delhi-walla) with Abbey (West Highland White Terrier). Asheville, North Carolina

Delhi Noir at the Rubin Museum

The Rubin Museum of Art in Manhattan played host for the launch of Delhi Noir, a collection of stories by various Indian authors about murder, sex, and intrigue in India's capital.  Edited by Hirsh Sawhney, the book presents fourteen authors, including Meera Nair, Siddharth Chowdhury, and Tabish Khair. 

The event at the Rubin featured readings by actors Rita Wolf (My Beautiful Laundrette, Homebody Kabul) and Ajay Naidu (subUrbia, The Guru, Loins of Punjab Presents), as well as a conversation among Sawhney, Meera Nair, and journalist/novelist Pete Hamill, a contributor to Brooklyn Noir, the first installment of the series.

Ajay Naidu (right) reads from Delhi Noir during a break in the conversation with Hirsh Sawhney and Pete Hamill

Meera Nair, Hirsh Sawhney, and Pete Hamill

Meera Nair

Memorial Day in the Hamptons

Wine tasting, Southampton, NY

Sag Harbor, NY

Sag Harbor, NY

Neel Murgai Ensemble at The Stone

The Neel Murgai Ensemble, an Indo-jazz fusion group, played The Stone last week on the Lower East Side, launching their new CD, Audionomic Stimulus Package.  Neel is a classically trained sitarist, who plays with Mission on Mars, the eclectic Brooklyn- and Queens-based Indo-world combo.  Neel has launched a new group with three virtuosos, Mat Maneri on viola, Sameer Gupta on tabla, and Greg Heffernan on cello.  See more pictures.

Neel Murgai

Mat Maneri

Greg Heffernan

Greg Heffernan & Sameer Gupta

Sameer Gupta & Neel Murgai

The Neel Murgai Ensemble

Manifestos and Dead Revolutionaries

My artist friend Sharlene Khan is part of the South African online magazine The Dead Revolutionaries Club.  The site recently published a collective effort on the idea of artistic and political manifestos.  Here's my contribution (though they wrongly list me as South African):

At the risk of spoiling the party, I will say that I am anti-manifesto. Manifestos are creeds, statements of belief, lists of political or artistic positions, loyalty tests, exclusionary devices, frontal challenges, stiflers of debate, rallying cries, ideological touchstones, political entrenchments, club memberships, weapons against dissent, willful provocations.

An artist's loyalty should be to his or her own integrity, to the intellectual and creative challenges, and to the work itself and not to a set of bullet points on a sheet of paper – which are political positions. Great art works against conventions, entrenched ideas, and grand pronouncements. It subverts expectations and creates new ones. It is the triumph of individual expression over groupthink.

You photograph (or paint, sculpt, write, carve) with all your ideology. It's there in what you create, unavoidable. It's unique. Embrace its fluid and ineluctable beauty in your work. That's your manifesto.

Love Letters to Mumbai: From the Asian American Writers Workshop

On May 14, the Asian American Writers Workshop in New York presented a forum called "Love Letters to Mumbai," featuring some prominent artists and writers who have a personal connection to the city.

Author and journalist Amitava Kumar

Author and filmmaker Sadia Shepard

Visual artist Jaishri Abichandani

Author and professor Vijay Prashad

See more pictures.

Indian Amusement Parks

Suraj Water Park, Mumbai

EsselWorld, Mumbai

Dizzee World, south of Chennai

Phagwah Celebrations in New York

In the Richmond Hill section of Queens, New York, Hindus from Guyana and Trinidad celebrate Phagwah, the Caribbean name for the Indian festival of Holi, by dousing each other with colored powders and liquids.  There is also a parade down Liberty Avenue, so the event becomes an Indo-Caribbean national day, marking the arrival of spring.  These photos are from 2004.