Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2026: Mumbai’s celebrated moments, misses, and what lies ahead

For nine days this February, the streets of Mumbai’s Kala Ghoda precinct became a canvas for creativity. The Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2026 brought together art, music, theatre, dance, and food, transforming the city itself into an immersive cultural playground. Indulge Express was on the ground to capture the performances, installations, and moments that made this edition a celebration of Mumbai’s artistic heartbeat.

What happened at Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2026?

Kala Ghoda Arts Festival 2026 unfolded like a city-wide story, each street and heritage corner a chapter brimming with surprises. Visual installations such as Our Dream House, Mumbai Flux, and Threads of Time invited wanderers to pause, to explore memory, urban life, and nature in unexpected ways. At the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, Networks of the Past offered a quiet journey into history, while theatre productions like Manjiri Matching Centre and children’s workshops added laughter, curiosity, and movement to the streets.

Music was the heartbeat of the festival — evenings at the Asiatic Library Steps shimmered with performances by Usha Uthup, Ricky Kej, Farhan Akhtar, Monali Thakur, and a soulful Sufi set by Kavita Seth, weaving generations and genres into a single, vibrant pulse. Cinema screenings, film interactions, and stand-up comedy kept the city moving from one corner to another, a gentle chaos of delight.

Inside CSMVS, the festival slowed down, allowing moments of quiet wonder. Exhibitions like Disobedient Subjects, treasure hunts, documentary screenings, and inclusive dance sessions by ADAPT gave space to reflect, play, and participate. Storytelling by Falguni Gokhale, hands-on workshops from wire sculptures with Chaahat to art-and-architecture exercises inspired by Antoni Gaudí, turned visitors into creators, letting them leave a piece of themselves in the precinct.

Everywhere, performance and cinema added a sparkle of unpredictability. Anurag Kashyap unveiled Kennedy, while O’Romeo brought Vishal Bhardwaj, Shahid Kapoor, and Triptii Dimri into candid conversation, accompanied by live music from Sukhwinder Singh and Rekha Bhardwaj. Theatre (Dharavi Dreams), poetry readings by Jerry Pinto and Menka Shivdasani, and panels like Brush of Hope: Power, Control, and Cyber Sextortion reminded audiences that the festival was not only playful but thoughtful, rooted in the pulse of contemporary Mumbai.

Standout moments lingered in memory — Vir Das launching The Outsider, a Kohrra Season 2 panel with Gunjit Chopra, Diggi Sisodia, and Mona Singh, and a graceful classical duet by Pavitra Bhat (Bharatanatyam) and Amrita Lahiri (Kuchipudi). The Rahul Deshpande Collective moved effortlessly from classical compositions to popular favourites like O Rangrez. On World Cancer Day, Tannishtha Chatterjee and Sharib Hashmi performed Breast of Luck to an audience that included veterans like Shabana Azmi. The festival’s rhythm — a seamless weave of art, music, theatre, and cinema — reflected the city’s diversity and heartbeat, leaving the streets alive with stories and memory.

What we loved

As we walked deeper into the precinct, the art installations offered moments of pause amid constant movement — some inviting curiosity, others quiet reflection. Kal Aaj Aur Kal drew us in with playful nostalgia, using everyday games and objects to collapse time and memory, while On Call With Bapu formed gentle queues of people eager to interact with history in an unexpectedly intimate way.

Parag Tandel’s The Last Catch stopped many in their tracks. Shaped like a prawn and constructed from green plastic bottles, it delivered a visually urgent commentary on marine pollution and Mumbai’s fishing communities. Works such as Timeline of Being and Life Beyond Numbers nudged viewers to think about evolution, balance, and loss, while JiyoMeterikal, inspired by Mumbai’s black-and-yellow taxis, translated the city’s familiar rhythms into abstract form.

Food was another highlight. A truck run by the Chefs of Koliwada — women home chefs from the Koli community of Cuffe Parade Koliwada, supported by the RPG Foundation’s women-empowerment initiative — offered prawn biryani and chicken biryani made with freshly ground masalas. Light yet deeply flavourful, it reminded visitors that protecting the sea is essential to preserving Mumbai’s seafood-driven food culture.

What didn’t work

Of course, every festival has its hiccups — Kala Ghoda 2026 was no exception. Incarcerated: Tales from Behind Bars, featuring Anand Teltumbde, Neeta Kolhatkar, and moderated by Naresh Fernandes, was cancelled at the last minute due to “security concerns” (cue dramatic sighs from eager attendees). Celebrating Gulzar and the theatre production Badalon Ka Shahar also vanished from the schedule like magic tricks gone wrong, leaving audiences clutching empty program slots and wistful Instagram stories.

And then there was the modern-day festival challenge: humans versus art. From ambitious selfie seekers forming slow-moving lines in front of every installation to groups blocking others’ views as if they owned the street, the struggle for a glimpse of creativity became a spectator sport in itself. One couldn’t help but think: the art deserved more attention than our camera rolls, and the people behind it deserved more than a human barricade. Civic sense might not win awards, but maybe it should — a little thoughtfulness goes a long way in letting everyone enjoy the magic without jostling, squeezing, or elbowing.

If the festival had a personality, it might be “charmingly unpredictable” at times — a glittering maze of art and music, with moments of mild exasperation sneaking in like unexpected plot twists. Yet these little setbacks only added colour to the stories people will.

What we can expect next year

Looking ahead, Kala Ghoda 2027 has the chance to become a festival of rhythm as much as of spectacle. Imagine a version where schedules are almost predictable, cancellations are rare, and interactive corners invite audiences to linger, rather than dash from one venue to another like caffeinated squirrels. More space to breathe, reflect, and absorb the art — perhaps even a few hidden nooks where one could pause with a biryani in hand — would turn a whirlwind of experiences into a journey worth savouring.

Building on this, the ethos Brinda Miller emphasises — that the festival belongs to the people — can guide next year’s edition. By continuing to open heritage spaces, fostering participation rather than just viewership, and welcoming new disciplines, technologies, and voices, Kala Ghoda 2027 can deepen engagement while remaining playful, thoughtful, and irreverently human — a place where art, memory and experimentation dance together effortlessly.

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