Bollywood Superstars: A Short Story of Indian Cinema, a new exhibition at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, explores the world of Indian storytelling. The exhibition, which just started and runs through June 4th, is jam-packed with information.
Bollywood movies are renowned for their complex plotlines, stirring musical compositions, and deftly choreographed dance sequences set in breathtaking settings. They are a captivating experience, full of highs and lows, in a seductive, larger-than-life universe.
According to Souraya Noujaim, head of scientific, curatorial, and collections management at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, “It’s a universal problem.” “Bollywood movies are well-known throughout the Middle East. It has achieved great success in this area. It’s a means of introducing popular culture to the classroom as well. That’s also the direction I want to go in. We must tear down these barriers, and this is only one of the many performances we offer in Abu Dhabi as a universal museum.
This is the first time the Louvre Abu Dhabi has held a large-scale film exhibition with a focus on the South Asian subcontinent. France Museums and Musee du Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac collaborated to organize the exhibition. The carefully designed exhibition is not only enjoyable for Bollywood fans and newcomers to the genre, but it is also instructive and inspirational.
According to Julien Rousseau, the exhibition’s organizer, “the original goal of the exhibition was to highlight major movies and main players of Indian cinema history.” More than 80 pieces of art, including pictures, textiles, graphic arts, costumes, and more than 30 film excerpts, are shown in the exhibition, which provides context for Indian cinema’s history from its early days in the late 19th century to the present.
It’s significant to note that the show is not organized chronologically. A variety of Indian film genres and artworks from the collections of the Louvre Abu Dhabi, Musée du quai Branly—Jacques Chirac, Musee de l’armee, Musee national des arts asiatiques—Guimét, al-Sabah Collection, Raja Ravi Varma Heritage Foundation, and Priya Paul Collection are used to create a cohesive experience.
Instead, it is divided into three sections that are each filled with a variety of artwork ranging from decorative to interactive, with each space being connected by brilliant colors and a blend of art, artifacts, and film. The first segment examines the earliest storytelling tools, including magic lanterns, shadow puppets, tapestries, costumes, and scrolls. The Mahabharata and the Ramayana, two of the most important Sanskrit epics of ancient India, are shown in the majority of them.
In the context of their historical and mythical origins, the second section shows the primary influence of some of the earliest films from Indian cinema as well as early major blockbusters. This section of the exhibition includes everything from movie trailers and posters to an interactive area where visitors may put themselves in different Bollywood movies by standing in front of a green screen with a changing background.
The exhibition’s last section focuses on more recent cinema as well as Bollywood’s leading actors. The magnificent single-screen Indian cinemas of the Art Deco period, where people would go in the 1970s to witness new releases and legendary Bollywood films in reruns, are exquisitely recreated in this section’s concluding segment. Most are now closed or deserted.
Additionally, the exhibition makes a point of showcasing Indian films that don’t just belong in the commercial category. According to Kessous, “cinema is a plural form in India.” “We also wanted to provide a peek at another type of cinema that depicts another type of India.”
The exhibition’s curators hope that viewers will gain a deeper grasp of the history of this popular film genre after visiting. Rousseau explains, “Mainly, we aim to show you how to appreciate and understand this history. We are not really here to explain the magic of the film since we are unable to do so. Up to June 4, Bollywood Superstars: A Short Story of Indian Cinema is on display at the Louvre Abu Dhabi.