Bloomsbury Festival to celebrate 50 years of Bangladesh Independence

Ansar Ahmed Ullah
Contributing Editor,Shottobani

London: 50 years of Bangladesh Independence will be celebrated with the local community, international artists and performers as part of a series of events in the Bloomsbury Festival that takes place between 15 – 24 October 2021.

The Bloomsbury Festival has worked with local communities, renowned artist Mohammed Ali, and performers and producers of Bangladeshi and South Asian heritage to create unique events for the wider community to sample British Bangladeshi and wider South Asian culture.

Supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, Bloomsbury Festival’s Visible People, Visible Places project has seen five young trainees recruited from the local community. They have been researching Bangladeshi history and culture to create an outdoor exhibition, Bengal to Camden, showcased during the festival, and have been recording and filming to create digital content about their community and to contribute to an outdoor projection which will be mapped onto a building in Cromer St as part of the Festival Opening event. The programme also includes a landmark event at the British Library.

Over 222,000 Bangladeshis live in London, with Camden being the third largest community in the capital.Some of the programmes of events celebrating Bangladeshi culture this year’s Bloomsbury Festival are Lights, Banners, Tigers – Live on Cromer Street on 15 October. Live on Cromer Street includes a procession of Bengali silk banners, kinetic tigers, and musicians, with neon sculptures, live video projection and performance. This outdoor event will celebrate the local community and its many diverse cultures with artwork from artists Chila Kumari Singh Burman, aerosol artist Mohammed Ali, and performance from international arts companies Kinetika, Shademakers UK, Arunima Kumar Dance, Bangladesh 50 at The British Library – A Celebration on 17 October, a free event in the outdoor piazza and large indoor foyer spaces featuring Mela performers, high profile speakers, Bangladeshi food, poetry, film screenings and projections, SOAS Concert series present Khiyo and special guests on 16 October SOAS, University of London, performing an array of Bengali songs and eclectic music, in celebration of fifty years of the existence of Bangladesh and finally Bengal to Camden on 24 Oct, Brunswick Square Gardens exhibition that will tell the stories of migration from Bangladesh to Camden, through a unique collection of photos and archives from the community, gathered and presented by the young people of Bloomsbury and Kings Cross.