Serendipity Arts announces THE BRIJ, a futuristic arts and culture centre in the National Capital Region that will host multiple creative projects and expressions, based on the principles of innovation, sustainability, accessibility, and inclusion

Panaji, December 2022: Serendipity Art today announced its vision to bring the arts to life through a cutting-edge arts and culture centre, that will be a bridge that connects the world to the arts, and its transformational power. THE BRIJ, will dedicate space, time, and resources to create ground-breaking art that is transformational and meaningful. Through this centre, Serendipity Arts also hopes to spark conversations around the arts across the South Asian region worldwide, assimilating regional flavours, traditions, and cultures, while also building a sustainable artistic ecosystem. The upcoming institution is named after and pays homage to late Mr. Brijmohan Lall Munjal, Indian industrialist and visionary, Mr. Sunil Kant Munjal’s father.

Outlining the idea behind THE BRIJ, Mr. Sunil Kant Munjal, Founder & Patron of Serendipity Arts and Founder of THE BRIJ, said, “Our privileges always come with responsibility; this initiative is a responsibility and a passion project for us. THE BRIJ stems from a responsibility we feel towards the arts; the way art is seen today, compared to how it was perceived in the region, prior to colonization. In terms of its programming, THE BRIJ will retain the aura of the flagship festival while adding multiple layers of practice, learning and experimentation to its programs, around the year. Planned around diverse creative practices, the facility will have higher arts education, incubation labs, centres of cultural innovation, performance spaces, and museums at a never-before-seen scale, in an interdisciplinary manner. In effect it will be the complete ecosystem for Arts & Culture at one place.”

The three essential elements of the Centre will be Education & Research, Multidisciplinary Experiences and Innovation & Incubation with training, workshops, and residencies. The one-of-its-kind centre is currently under construction and will have a Museum, an Academy & Workshop, a Gallery, Library, a Stepwell Gallery, an Arena, Theatre and Black Box, and much more. The facility will also house a crafts centre and an artisanal village, where dying and fringe art & craft forms will be brought back to life, through research, practice, and incubation. The entire campus has been designed in a way that it is 100 percent accessible to the differently abled.

With interdisciplinarity, education, and intergenerational exchange as its key purposes, THE BRIJ will emphasise excellence, change, innovation, equality, integrity, and responsibility. The aim is to gift the city of Delhi and the nation a cultural centre, enabling visitors with a shared passion and curiosity for the arts to cherish and immerse in it, inclusively. The centre hopes to create a space that attracts academics, intellectuals, students, art lovers, critics, artists, and members of the public, who can come together to create a bustling creative community.

With cutting-edge technologies that promise to bring forth unique and engaging experiences for visitors, THE BRIJ will be truly global in form and spirit. It will have all the ingredients for an inclusive and immersive experience with assisted navigation and omnichannel availability, while also driving the imperatives of sustainability through a reduced carbon footprint. At the same time, an efficient operational backend, a robust infrastructure for security and connectivity, and futuristic technologies will support the museum and the dream.

Speaking about THE BRIJ, Ms Smriti Rajgarhia, Director, Serendipity Arts Foundation and Festival, said, “THE BRIJ is our endeavour to strengthen India’s place in the global cultural dialogue and make international art accessible to the discerning and the common enthusiast. We aim to contribute to the cultural quotient of the region, through restored artworks and revival of lost or at-risk art forms, while also seeking to redefine the future of arts through interdisciplinary collaboration and innovation.”

Among the many features that make this cultural centre unique are the twin driving forces of economy and sustainability, both of which find expression through this building. THE BRIJ will also aim to meet the Foundation’s aspiration to emerge as a catalyst for change, by creating employment opportunities, contributing to India’s and New Delhi’s cultural economy and attracting both Indian and international tourists. Courtesy of Serendipity Arts, THE BRIJ already has and will further enhance its partnerships and exchanges with global institution and creative organizations, to build a facility with state-of-the-art infrastructure, that is organic and future facing.

The entire campus of THE BRIJ would have a platinum rating for green buildings and will generate more than 5200 direct and indirect employment. Besides, more than 120,000 people are expected to benefit from the education and skilling programmes that will be made available. About 90,000 young learners will have free access to the museum, with over 200 art start-ups and projects supported through the incubation centre. Through its multilateral and multicultural platform, the one-of-its-kind Museum hopes to significantly contribute to India’s GDP.

Speaking on the initiative, key member of our expert panel of architects, Mr. Dikshu Kukreja, Managing Principal, CP Kukreja Architects (CPKA), New Delhi said, “The design philosophy for THE BRIJ is to create a co-existential architecture where the building and landscape dissolve into one. The architecture amplifies its context with buildings envisioned as magnified rock outcrops just like the quartzite rock formations found on the site. The design allows the adjoining forest to permeate into the site. All this as the vibrant and varied programmatic elements form a musical ensemble experiencing hitherto unexplored and futuristic sustainable design strategies.”

In addition to Mr Sunil Kant Munjal, THE BRIJ is also the dream of patron and social entrepreneur Shefali Munjal, Founder-Patron of THE BRIJ. The Board of Advisors include media personality and the current Chair of the Royal College of Arts, UK, Sir Peter Bazelgette; Harsh Goenka, Chairman of the RPG Group, an ardent collector of art and a strong advocate for fostering innovation; and Deepak Iyer, who heads the Accenture Microsoft Business group for Southeast Asia.

Advisors for THE BRIJ include poet, cultural theorist, and curator Ranjit Hoskote; Manu Chandra, Chef Partner for THE BRIJ and one of the pioneers of the gastropub scene in India; Shubha Mudgal, Padma Shri recipient and winner of the Gold Plaque Award for Special Achievement in Music at the Chicago International Film Festival; Aneesh Pradhan, noted table player; and Anuradha Kapur, recipient of the Sangeet Natak Award for Direction in Theatre and the instrumental figure at the National School of Drama, Delhi and Bangalore.