ABOUT SCARLET MELA FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS
The Scarlet Mela Festival (SMFA) is a platform to celebrate, facilitate and incubate young and upcoming independent traditional arts practitioners. This creative space provides an opportunity to seed discourse between traditional arts and its contemporary interpretations through creation, education, and incubation. The aim of the festival is to gather a community of critical arts practitioners who value tradition and are excited to push boundaries and want to be the change-makers for the next generation. The first iteration of SMFA focuses on an incubation programme for the dance sector in traditional arts, encompassing all cultural dance forms (ie., chinese dance, malay dance, and indian dance). Throughout the 8 weeks, participants will alternate between workshops designed to equip them with tools to aid in the creative process, and individual consultation sessions with their assigned creative consultants to further develop their work. Participants will undergo a circular creative process: from ideating to planning, pitching, performing, and evaluating their work. Throughout the process, participants will constantly be challenged to deconstruct, reconstruct, as well as question the relevance and meaning of their traditional practice in the modern context. As part of the process, participants will be required to maintain a digital journal documenting their creative ideas, experiences, and reflections. The programme will culminate in a presentation of the participants' works at a closed door 'Pitch to Producers' event, where participants present a 5-10 minute long work in progress to invited producers from within the industry. The event will provide a platform for the participants to connect with producers who will be able to further aid in the development of their work.
