“Every child is special” ! Based on this concept, fifty years ago in Nagpur, iconic artist-painter Chandrakant Channe launched Basoli, the children art group -- inviting children to sort of a museum without walls. “It has been my dream to give the fullest possible expression to children through arts -- painting, pottery, puppetry, theatre, music, dance what have you. I am happy, that I have been able to live that dream for such a long period,” Chandrakant Channe says with a palpable sense of pride and satisfaction. On June 1, 2024, Basoli adds one more project to enhance the fifty-year flavour. In the memory of great socio-political leader the late Sumatibai Suklikar, it will hold a Mid-Night Dream Festival of arts from 7.30 in the evening to 5 next morning (June 2) at the famed Bal Jagat in Laxmi Nagar, Nagpur.

 

This is promising to be an intense experience in which 150 child artists, 50 professional painters, 10 sculptors, 3 cartoonists will present their respective works of art with appropriate expression. At the time of inaugural at 7.30 p.m. on Saturday (June 1), a massive canvas will await invitees to pick up the brush or the pencil and draw whatever they wish -- as a collective artistic experience. This Mid-Night Dream Festival is one of the monthly projects Basoli wishes to present during its Golden Jubilee year. The inspiration of Basoli came from an odd North Indian village Basholi where art has been traditionally a matter of collective culture. When Chandrakant Channe launched the art group fifty years ago with a couple of street plays to publicise the activity, the name got changed to a simpler Basoli.