Curators

4. Ranjit Barot - hi res Standing with drums

2025

CURATOR

Ranjit Barot is a drummer, singer, music composer, music director and music arranger. Born into a family steeped in Indian classical music and dance, melody and rhythm has always been an integral part of Ranjit’s life. He started playing at the age of 12, encouraged by his mother, the legendary Kathak dancer, Sitara Devi.

His early career saw performances with Louis Banks & the Jazz Yatra Sextet, Pandit Ravi Shankar, the maestros, (late) Don Cherry & (late) Charlie Mariano. Ranjit Barot is today on the forefront of both worlds, the mainstream popular Indian/World music and Jazz fusion genres. He is the musical director for all of A.R. Rahman’s live concerts and is the drummer for guitar legend John Mclaughlin and the 4th Dimension band.

Ranjit has also had a long career in composition and music production, working out of his own studio facility, in Mumbai, India. His strong roots in the Indian classical tradition and his own world‐view of music gave him a unique perspective on the Indian film genre. His career spans projects over the last almost four decades as a featured drummer and arranger for musicians such as R.D. Burman, right up to A.R. Rahman. Ranjit was the music composer and sound designer for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Commonwealth Games Delhi 2010, and Music Producer for MTV Unplugged (Season 1 & 2).

Lillete Dubey 1

2025

CURATOR

Lillete Dubey is a renowned award winning Indian film, television and stage actor and a theatre director. Founder and artistic director of The Primetime Theatre Company, her theatrical work has travelled all over the globe and directed 37 plays for the company so far. Her award winning production Dance Like a Man has completed nearly 700 shows worldwide and is the longest running Indian English play.

Ms Dubey has performed in over 75 films and shows, including Monsoon Wedding, Gadar, Baghban, Zubeida, Kal ho na ho, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel 1& 2, Indian Summers ( Channel 4 UK), Mumbai Calling (BBC, UK) and most recently the Netflix hit Dabba Cartel, and has acted in over 50 plays from Brecht to the Bard, winning multiple Best Actress awards for her plays and films in National & International Festivals. 

She has been on the jury of several theatre and film competitions, including the Osian Film Festival, the Mahindra Excellence in Theatre Awards, the Sultan Padamsee Playwrighting awards, the TOI AutHer book awards and has curated the theatre section of the Serendipity Arts FestivalShe is currently shooting for a feature film and is touring with her plays including her magnum opus JAYA, a rock musical of the Mahabharata.

Prashant Panjiar Photograph by MANISH SINHA
Prashant Panjiar Photograph by MANISH SINHA

2025

CURATOR

Prashant Panjiar, a self-taught photographer, worked full-time as a photojournalist and editor in mainstream media from 1984 to 2001. Since then he has been working independently as a photographer specializing in reportage, editorial and documentary photography, a photo editor and curator. He is the co-founder and managing trustee of Nazar Foundation that promotes lens-based art. His latest initiative is the multi-disciplinary Goa Open Arts Festival and the Goa Open Arts Catalyst Grant that he co-founded and launched in 2020. His more recent books are Amongst the Believers–The Kumbh Mela at Prayag (published by Arthshila Trusts, 2024), Indianism (self-published 2023) and That Which Is Unseen (published by Navajivan Trust, 2021).
As the co-founder of the Delhi Photo Festival, Panjiar led the curatorial teams of all three editions. He also curated the first edition of Sensorium a festival of Arts, Literature & Ideas for Sunaparanta, Goa Centre for the Arts; exhibitions for the first two editions of the Serendipity Arts Festival, Goa; and was project curator for Kanu’s Gandhi exhibition. Panjiar has also served on the jury of the World Press Photo Awards, the China International Press Photo Competition and POY (Pictures of the Year International).

Dinesh Khanna

2025

CURATOR

Dinesh Khanna has been working as a professional photographer for more than 35 years with an eclectic blend of commercial and personal work. His personal work has been published as acclaimed books like Bazaar and Living Faith. The latest books he has worked on are: Right of the Line–The President’s Bodyguard and Life in Rashtrapati Bhawan which have been commissioned by the Rashtrapati Bhawan and Sahapedia. 

Over the years his work has also been shown in solo, and group shows in galleries from Delhi to New York and Varanasi to San Francisco. He has also done several assignments for the Incredible India campaign, including the prestigious one for the Taj Mahal’s 350th anniversary. Dinesh is also a Managing Trustee of Nazar Foundation, and one of the Co-founders of the Delhi Photo Festival and also a Photography Curator for the first two editions of Serendipity Arts Festival. He has taught Photography in various institutions like Ashoka University, The One School, Goa, Jamia Milia and MICA, Ahmedabad amongst others. He is a Director of the Dhrish Academy of Photography at the Museo Camera, conducts Photography courses and workshops and was a Visual Consultant with Sahapedia.

RANJIT HOSKOTE-Portrait 3 by Priyesha Nair

2025

CURATOR

Ranjit Hoskote is a poet, cultural theorist, and curator. He has been pivotal to shaping contemporary art discourse in India, and in registering multiple cultural issues, artistic domains, and moments of history. He has been honoured with prestigious awards like the Sahitya Akademi Golden Jubilee Award, the Sahitya Akademi Translation Award, the Sanskriti Award for Literature, the SH Raza Award for Literature, and the 7th Mahakavi Kanhaiyalal Sethia Award for Poetry.

Hoskote curated India’s first-ever national pavilion at the Venice Biennale (2011) and was co-curator, with Okwui Enwezor and Hyunjin Kim, of the 7th Gwangju Biennale (2008). Since 1993, he has curated numerous exhibitions of visual art, both in India and internationally: these include museum retrospectives of major artists such as Jehangir Sabavala (NGMA, Mumbai and Delhi, 2005-06), Atul Dodiya (NGMA Delhi, 2013) and MF Husain (Mathaf Museum of Modern Art, Doha, 2019), as well as transhistorical research-oriented exhibitions such as The Sacred Everyday: Embracing the Risk of Difference (Serendipity Arts Festival, Goa, 2018).

Anuradha Kapur, theatre director and curator
Anuradha Kapur, theatre director and curator

2025

CURATOR

Anuradha Kapur is a theatre-maker and teacher. She is the founder-member of Vivadi, a cross-disciplinary group of theatre-makers, visual artists, film-makers, musicians and writers who attempt to connect practice with research in their work. 

Anuradha Kapur taught at the National School of Drama, New Delhi for more than three decades; and was Director of the School from 2007 to 2013. She has also held visiting professorships at Ambedkar University, Delhi, the University of Warwick and the University of Cape Town. She curated the performance window of the exhibit body.city: siting contemporary culture in India at the House of World Cultures, Berlin, in 2003; co-curated the theatre section of the Serendipity Arts Festival, Goa in 2015 and 2016; and was part of the curatorial team of the International Theatre Festival of Kerala (ITFoK), Thrissur in 2017 and 2023. Her book, Actors Pilgrims Kings and Gods: The Ramlila at Ramnagar, was published by Seagull Books, Calcutta (1993, 2004). For her work in the theatre, Anuradha Kapur was awarded the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for Direction in 2004.  

Rahaab portrait

2025

CURATOR

Rahaab Allana is a Curator/Publisher at the Alkazi Foundation for the Arts, New Delhi. A Charles Wallace grant awardee and Fellow of the Royal Asiatic Society (UK), he was Honorary Research Associate at University College, London. He is the founder of ASAP | art (Alternative South Asia Photography & Art), the region’s first app for presentation and discussion of contemporary visual cultural production. He was Guest Editor for the themed issue Delhi: Looking Out/Looking In, ‘Aperture 243’ (Summer 2021). 

He also acted as the editor of Unframed: Discovering Image Practices in South Asia (Harper Collins Publishers India and Alkazi Foundation, 2023) and Another Lens: Photography and the Emergence of Image Culture (Tulika Books and West Heavens, 2024), which are two critical readers on lens-based practices and meta-histories of the image. He is on the Arts and Culture Committee, Asia Society (India Chapter). He was recently awarded the Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters from the Government of France.

Hi Res_Ravi Agarwal_SAF 2025

2025

CURATOR

Ravi Agarwal is an interdisciplinary artist, photographer, environmental campaigner, writer, and curator whose practice addresses the complex relationship between nature and its future through photography, video, text, and installation. He has exhibited at various biennales including Lahore (2024), Havana (2019), Yinchuan (2018), Kochi (2016), Sharjah (2013), and Documenta XI (2002). He has also curated large public art projects like Yamuna-Elbe (2009) and Embrace Our Rivers (2018). He curated New Natures, A terrible beauty is born (Goethe Institute, Mumbai, January 2022), and Imagined Documents at the Les Rencontres d’Arles (July 2022). He was the photography curator for Serendipity in 2017 and 2018 and Co-Convenor for the Bergen Assembly 2025 (Norway).
 
Agarwal is also the founder of the environmental NGO Toxics Link (www.toxicslink.org) and The Shyama Foundation (www.sharedecologies.org) which supports initiatives at the intersection of art and ecology in India. Agarwal is a recipient of the UN Award for Chemical Safety and the Ashoka Fellowship.

Prahlad IMG1

2025

CURATOR

Prahlad Sukhtankar is a restaurateur, sommelier, and culinary curator deeply rooted in Goa’s evolving food landscape. An alumnus of Les Roches and César Ritz, and a certified sommelier from the International Sommelier Guild, Prahlad is the founder of The Black Sheep Bistro Panjim and Aguada and co-founder of Melt Pizzabar. His work blends sustainability, storytelling, and regional pride. As a returning curator at the Serendipity Arts Festival, he brings a fresh, mindful lens to India’s diverse culinary traditions, focusing this year on The Salt Routes of India—a journey through the heritage, history, and cultural importance of salt.