If we cannot change,
can we ever be free?
Independence, as an
internal construct
A nation can declare its independence on a particular day. An individual may spend an entire lifetime trying to understand what freedom means.
Our lives are shaped by invisible architectures of family, gender, class, language, memory, faith, geography, desire and fear. Some give us belonging. Others quietly determine the boundaries within which we learn to exist.
Each year, IFBE brings together artists, dancers, musicians, writers and thinkers who enter this territory through their own disciplines and lived experience, creating a space in which audiences can encounter different expressions of freedom, and perhaps, reconsider their own.
The purpose is not to arrive at a shared definition of independence, but to create the conditions in which each of us might find our own.
Moments from an
evolving enquiry
Four editions
One question,
carried forward
Each edition allows new voices and artistic practices to challenge what came before, building over time a growing archive of the freedoms we possess, seek, and may unknowingly deny ourselves and others.
Celebrating the Open Mind
A celebration of curiosity, diverse perspectives, and the courage to question, rethink and imagine beyond the familiar.
Explorations at the Crossroads of Self & Society
An enquiry into the relationship between individual identity and collective life, where personal narratives meet the forces that shape society.
Freedom and the Crosshairs of Fun and Fear
A deep dive into two disparate experiences of freedom: courage, adventure, uncertainty, possibility, joy, politics, liberation and self-determination.
The Quiet Art of Presence
An invitation to pause, listen, and reconnect with the richness of being fully present, in ourselves, with others, and in the world.
Metamorphosis
Change as a condition for freedom
There is no independence without change, because to become free is, inevitably, to become different.
Metamorphosis is rarely comfortable, and genuine transformation seldom arrives without the loss of something familiar, whether an old conviction, an inherited prejudice, a prescribed role, a relationship with power or a version of ourselves in which we once felt secure.
Yet societies that cannot change become trapped by their histories, institutions that cannot change lose their relevance, and individuals who cannot change risk mistaking familiarity for freedom.
The fifth edition of The Independence Project places this tension at its centre and asks whether our capacity to transform may ultimately determine our capacity to be free.
Across art, dance, music, literature and conversation, Metamorphosis explores change not as an inevitability, but as an act of courage: the willingness to question what we know, relinquish what no longer serves us and enter the uncertainty of what we might become.
Through different disciplines and perspectives, artists and audiences will come together to consider one of the most difficult freedoms of all:
The freedom to change.
Voices of the Project
Across five editions, this is the full roster of artists, performers and collaborators who have shaped the enquiry, credited here by name and by the work they brought to IFBE.
Audience Reflections
I came for the performances and left questioning things about myself I hadn't examined in years.
It's rare to find a festival that trusts its audience with difficult questions instead of easy answers.
Two days that felt less like attending an event and more like being let into a genuine conversation.
Independence Needs Independence
Certain cultural spaces must retain the freedom to ask questions without asking permission first.
For this reason, we do not seek corporate sponsorship or large institutional support. The Project is sustained entirely by individuals who encounter this idea and recognise something of their own convictions within it.
A cultural project concerned with independence should itself be supported by a community of independent minds.
Patron
Friend of Freedom
Champion of Change
Founding Circle
Your patronage enables us to commission original work, support artists and performers, invite writers and thinkers, widen public access, and preserve the curatorial freedom that has defined the Project since its inception. Every contribution, irrespective of size, becomes part of the collective independence that allows the Project to remain independent.
Champions of Change
- Vikas Kataria & Supriya KatariaKUMARI
- Hemant MataiTrinity Global
- Nilesh GuravToast Events
- Warren D'souzaSound.com
- Neale MurrayHyperlink Events
- Rishabh KhoslaFreedom Tree
Founding Circle
- Kamal Malik
- Abhijit Mehta
- Arjun Malik
- Amrita Malik
Our Patrons & Friends of Freedom
- Ajay Srinivasan
- Ashok Mirwani
- Dhiraj Menda
- Dilip Mansukhani
- Harsh Vardhan Parihar
- Jitendra Mirwani
- Jacky Mirwani
- Karan Bhardwaj
- Kush Gupta
- Mayur Mirwani
- Prakash Vaswani
- Prem Mirwani
- Rachana Darda
- Rajashree Vipin
- Rashmi Tandon
- Rajesh Verma
- Rajiv Mirwani
- Rani Aildasani
- Saijan Vijayan
- Sangeeta Babani
- Sanjay Verma
- Vikas Phadnis
- Vijayalaxmi Parihar