KALA DARSHINI

Kala Darshini is a Jesuit institute of Fine Arts and Culture. It was founded on 31^st July 1990 in the premises of Andhra Loyola College, Vijayawada. "Kala Darshini" means 'the one who shows the way, a pointer, guide or guru'. The primary objective of Kala Darshini is to promote cultural consciousness in the people of Andhra State especially in the Catholics. In the last eighteen years, Kala Darshini has trained thousands of Christian youth in fine and folk arts.

Under cultural formation Kala Darshini offers three types of training programmes, namely, job-oriented part time and full-time courses, intensive summer courses and short-term courses. Classes are held in 20 disciplines of fine arts and folk arts all through the year and about 800 students receive training annually. Kala Darshini had also organized numerous short-term folklore courses for the animators, medical and social workers.

All the contributions of Kala Darshini hither to rendered either to the State is concretely artistic in nature. Through its entire varied and creative ventures it is attending to the artistic needs of the state. Cultural conscientization targets all age groups regardless of caste, creed, regional, linguistic discriminations. The summer course with its residential facility offered people statewide to attend the courses of their choice for a month. The cultural festivals provided platform to the deserving talented youth to win awards in a just and fair way.   No cultural event in the city is regarded as prestigious as the cultural festival of Kala Darshini. Children regard the awards given by Kala Darshini as a symbol of great honour and prestige. 

Specific Cultural Contributions of Kala Darshini

Kala Darshini primarily committed to the cultural formation, preservation and promotion. The following are its major annual activities.

1.     Cultural consciousness: Kala Darshini conducts part-time, full-time, bi-weekly annual courses and short-term courses besides its already existing summer course to bring about cultural awareness among the people. As many as 300 students for annual courses, 500 for summer courses, 250 for Gandharva University exams enroll every year. The training is offered in almost 15 disciplines. 

2.     Cultural Festivals: In order to recognize the most talented artiste youth and to encourage them Kala Darshini had been organizing cultural festivals for last ten years. The competitions held for five days in 12 disciplines of art. They are conducted in a strict and fair manner with meticulous arrangements. About 2000 students from 100 institutions in the city take part in the event with great enthusiasm. The winners are given away awards by an eminent artiste. Viajayawada city considers this cultural festival as one of the major events of the city. 

3.     Cultural dialogue: In an attempt to connect itself with the fellow cultural organizations of the city, Kala Darshini makes use of every opportunity to collaborate with them.  Associated programmes are held in the city twinned with other cultural organizations. The same organizations are invited to perform and dialogue. The institute is ever open to dialogue with the cultural organization for better promotion of art and for its preservation.

4.     Honouring the renowned artistes: Artistes of national reputation are invited to Kala Darshini during the cultural festival and felicitated. Padmavibhushan Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna, Padmari Sobha Naidu, Padmasri Vedantam Satyanarayana Sharma, Kala tapaswi K. Viswanath Urvasi Sarada, Kalabharathi Jamuna, Padmasri S.P. Balasubrahmanyam, Hamsa Awardee Dr. Alekhya are some of them. These artistes are shown as role models for the young aspiring artistes to emulate and grow.

5.     Monthly Programmes: In order to provide the art-lovers of the city an opportunity to know, interact and enjoy the performances of the outstanding artistes in the city, state and country, Kala Darshini launched 'Samskruthika Vedika' in 2006 to organize monthly programmes. Six to eight programmes are periodically arranged from the field of dance, music, drama during the year.

6.      New Model Art High School: In 2001 Kala Darshini launched an innovative and creative programme called ‘New Model Art High School’ to empower the rural poor talented children in Fine and Folk Arts. The programme consists of training in Fine Arts and academic education simultaneously. The primary objective is to create a double benefit for the children to become artistes while at the same time not foregoing their studies. The programmes was successfully organized for last eight years and the results are overwhelming. Through this school we were able to produce a number of dancers, musicians, painters and helped them to settle in life.

About 80 students are admitted every year in this school. Kala Darshini takes care of their boarding, lodging and their academic requirements. Since most of them come from utterly a poor background, Kala Darshni spends much of its resources to provide facilities to these students. These student remain with us for three to five years.

Nandi Awards:

Kala Darshini took part in the Nandi Natakotsav 2001 which the A.P. stage government organized as its annual feature. The institute staged ‘Prema Samrajyam’ a dance drama on the kingdom of God and won four Nandi awards. The awards were given for best make up, best music direction, best actor (special jury award) and best production. The awards were given away by the former Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh Sri Chandra Babu Naidu. No drama bagged so many awards that year and even today in Krishna district too no other troupe won as many awards as kala darshini.

A moment of glory: Kala Darshini considers it a moment of glory for the institute. No Christian play has ever won such prestigious state award in the history of Christian theatre. It is the first of its kind. The institute prides in its unique achievement. Some very noted professional artistes of Vijayawada city participated in the performance.

The same dance drama had been staged more than 60 times in the state on various occasions. It was staged in almost every district of Andhra Pradesh. Its strength lies in the dances, dialogues and the technical excellence. Some settings have a cinematic effect on the audience. It has always been well received wherever it was performed.