About Us
Where Art and Conscience Meet
Art, Thought & Conscience
An independent festival that believes art, thought, and conscience belong in the same room.
The Urgyen Art Festival is an independently organised, not-for-profit cultural platform founded in Pune, India. We bring together artists, scholars, musicians, filmmakers, activists, and communities to explore — through the full range of artistic expression — the questions that matter most to our time.
We are not a gallery. We are not a conference. We are not a religious institution. We are a space where a sculptor, a poet, a constitutional scholar, and a documentary photographer can share a stage and discover that they have been working on the same question from different directions.
Everything at the Urgyen Art Festival is free — free of charge, free of hierarchy, free of institutional gatekeeping. We believe culture belongs to everyone, and that the most important conversations happen when the doors are open.
A Centenary. A Translation.
A Father's Life's Work.
And a decision to build something that lasts.
The festival was born in 2025 from a deeply personal act of remembrance. Dr. Asmita Gaikwad and Dr. Jivak Gaikwad — the festival's founders — conceived the inaugural edition as a celebration of the birth centenary of Urgyen Sangharakshita (1925–2018), the Buddhist teacher and founder of the Triratna Buddhist Community.
The centenary carried an intimate meaning. Dr. Asmita's late father, Dhammachari Dharmarakshit, had a deep personal and spiritual bond with Sangharakshita spanning decades. Dharmarakshit had spent years translating Sangharakshita's poetry into Marathi, a manuscript he did not live to see published.
That book — Mantramugdha Hridaya — was launched at the festival's inaugural edition. Its publication was, in a sense, the festival's first act.
The inaugural Urgyen Art Festival was held from 21 to 26 August 2025 at the Balagandharva Kala Dalan — six consecutive days of meditation workshops, scholarly lectures, panel discussions, live sculpture, live painting, calligraphy, music, and a book launch. All free. All open to the public.
Six Things. Every Year. Free.
A diverse programme bringing artistic expression, intellectual inquiry and direct experience together.
Exhibition of Art
Curated exhibitions of painting, sculpture, photography, and printmaking — with a deliberate focus on artists whose work has been overlooked by the mainstream gallery world.
Scholarly Discourse
Panel discussions and lectures that put art historians, constitutional scholars, Buddhist philosophers, and social activists in conversation with each other and with the public.
Live Art
Sculptors carving, painters working on canvas, and calligraphers demonstrating — live, in progress, before an audience. Art as practice, not product.
Performance
Theatre, music, and film screenings — works rooted in the same social and spiritual consciousness as the festival's visual and intellectual programming.
Meditation Practice
Each day of the festival begins with an open meditation workshop — grounding the intellectual and aesthetic content in direct experience.
Preservation of Heritage
A sustained commitment to preserving and reviving India's ancestral art traditions — Buddhist iconography and tribal art forms passed down through generations.
What Happened When the Doors Were Open
Five Commitments We Will Not Trade
ACCESS
Every event at the Urgyen Art Festival is free. Culture is not a luxury. It is a right, and we intend to honour that.
INTEGRITY
No corporate interests. No political agendas. The festival is sustained by a community of artists, scholars, and volunteers who believe in the work.
INCLUSION
We deliberately platform artists and voices that the mainstream cultural establishment has ignored, marginalised, or failed to recognise.
PRESERVATION
India's ancestral art forms — Indigenous arts, Buddhist iconography, and tribal traditions — are living traditions at risk.
DIALOGUE
Art and scholarship cannot live in separate rooms. We bring them into the same conversation and trust our audience with the complexity that follows.
GLOBAL VISION
Art has no passport. What India's artists and thinkers are doing belongs to a global conversation.
The 2026 Edition
Aspects of Compassion in the Constitution of India
In its second year, the Urgyen Art Festival grows — in scale, in ambition, and in the deliberate choice of a theme that speaks to the moment India is in.
The Constitution of India is not merely a legal document. It is an act of imagination — a vision of a country that chooses dignity over hierarchy, fraternity over division, and compassion over indifference.
The 2026 edition, held from 1 to 3 September 2026 in Pune, asks: through the eyes of artists, what does that compassion look like today? And is it still intact?
The programme features an inaugural solo exhibition of the work of Savindra Sawarkar, alongside panel discussions, free theatre, film screenings, meditation workshops, and an Artists' Symposium.
All events are free. All are open to everyone.
Built by Few. Sustained by Many.
The people whose vision, experience, guidance and dedication help shape the Urgyen Art Festival.
Dh Dr Jivak ( V D Gaikwad)
A Medical professional, ordained in Triratna Buddhist Community in 1987, while still training in Medical college. Decorated with three National awards for his dedicated service in Defence estate hospital in Pune. Creator of Karunadeep foundation, Urgyen art festival and Urgyen art global. Dr. Jivak brings together the Buddhist community, the artistic world, and the broader public through a vision of culture as Dharma practice.
Chandrashekhar Daithankar
A distinguished administrator and a valued advisor, Chandrashekhar Daithankar brings decades of experience, wisdom and leadership.
His thoughtful guidance, unwavering support and commitment have made him a trusted pillar and an invaluable source of strength to the organisation and its initiatives.
Dr. Asmita Gaikwad
The festival was, in part, born from Dr. Asmita's deep connection to her late father, Dhammachari Dharmarakshit — translator, Dharma practitioner, and lifelong devotee of Urgyen Sangharakshita.
Dhammachari Tejdarshan
Ordained into the Triratna Buddhist Order in 1992, Dhammachari Tejdarshan has devoted over three decades to the practice, teaching and communication of the Dhamma. He has served in key roles including Chairman, Director and Project Manager, while teaching meditation and Buddhist practice in India and internationally.
His work combines spiritual practice, leadership and social engagement, inspiring people towards greater awareness, compassion and meaningful transformation.
Shri Santosh Sankhad
Director, art director, and choreographer, Santosh Sankhad shapes the festival's visual and artistic identity, ensuring that every element of the programme carries the aesthetic intelligence the work deserves.
Come Find Us
The festival is in Pune. The conversation is everywhere. If you are an artist, scholar, student, practitioner, or simply someone who believes that art matters — you are the audience we are making this for.
Email: urgyenart@gmail.com
Phone: +91 98239 59019 · +91 94210 55229
Balagandharva Rang Mandir, Jangali Maharaj Road, Pune
urgyenartglobal.com