A view of the Mumbai skyline.
Credit: iStock Photo
Mumbai: The iconic Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS) has added a Mumbai gallery, which will showcase the story of Mumbai.
The Mumbai gallery is planned as a platform that will showcase diverse ideas through cyclical long-term exhibitions that can bring out unique facets of the city and its daily life.
The first exhibition in the Mumbai gallery is dedicated to the millions of people who have shaped it and for whom the city is their destiny and future.
Considered to be one of the fastest-growing cities of the world, a business centre and a city that has absorbed many cultures to create its own, Mumbai is a magical place, full of chances and struggles.
The initiative is supported by the Hemendra Kothari Foundation and the H T Parekh Foundation.
The gallery was conceived by Sabyasachi Mukherjee, Director General of the CSMVS, and was shaped with the advice of a 19-member advisory committee with experts from different fields and faculties. It is hoped that the Mumbai gallery will become a platform for experimentation and presentation of new and historic themes around Mumbai.
A specially created visual timeline on the history of Mumbai and its environs captures the many layers of Mumbai’s making, not just from the last centuries but for thousands of years right from the geological formation of the Deccan plateau to Mumbai becoming a business hub for Asia.
Archaeological objects, coins, paintings, photographs, models, naval heritage, postcards, contemporary works of art, books, digital works of art, videos and anecdotes make the core of the gallery and should be seen again and again to absorb the multiple layers of history.
Mumbai represents the creativity, passion, resilience, commitment, flexibility, and courage of individuals who have gathered in this geographical location, over hundreds of years, to co-exist.
The ‘People of Mumbai’ as a collective are the spirit of the city - they represent the idea of Mumbai.
“Built on the efforts, stories, dreams, and lives of this collective, the gallery celebrates the citizens of Mumbai, and their diversity. The individual narratives of the city, told by its people form the identity of Mumbaikars, - who they were, what they have become and what will be their collective future. The lives, joys and struggles of the inhabitants of Bombay, now Mumbai show how ‘people’ design a city by inhabiting space with their social and cultural moorings; their entrepreneurial aspirations and their struggles to survive and thrive,” a CSMVS statement said.
The People of Mumbai exhibition focuses on the histories, contributions, and lives of people through the geographic landscape, the early inhabitants, and the social, economic, and cultural evolution of the city over time.
The exhibition has three sections – Mumbai as – a City of Opportunity, a City of Migrants, and a City of Cosmopolitanism. The Exhibition features works of art from 16 lenders, artists and collectors capturing the essence of the city.