In a city where conversations around gender and representation are frequent, moments of genuine re-calibration remain rare. “The Other Voice” arrives at Bengal Shilpalay on January 28 not as a slogan-driven exhibition, but as a visual argument—one that insists women’s artistic practices in Bangladesh cannot be reduced to footnotes, themes, or exceptions.

Walking through the exhibition feels like stepping into a world of bold and lively colours. Instead of canvas, many artworks are painted on steel rickshaw backs, staying true to the original form.

“Lutfar Pradeep” is a solo performance by veteran actor Chitralekha Guha, her first one-woman stage act in a career spanning more than four decades. Describing the work, Guha said it is “the story of a resolute woman who may break, but never bends,” adding that the play blends personal emotion with historical reflection. “I feel deeply moved to be part of such a story,” she said.

Standing amid a clamorous social and political landscape, the production attempts to hold up a mirror to society, the state, and the inner lives of individuals—without dialogue, spectacle, or easy resolution.

Set roughly fifteen centuries in the past, the narrative refuses the comfort of historical distance. Instead, it uses Khona’s story to interrogate questions that remain unresolved: how women’s knowledge is dismissed, how class and authority shape truth, and how power silences voices that challenge it. The play’s central argument is unambiguous—oppression often begins at home, long before it becomes institutional.

Published by Unicorn and distributed locally by University Press Limited, the book resists the narrow frames through which Bangladesh has often been viewed since its independence in 1971. International narratives have long leaned on images of poverty, disaster, and despair. Grey’s work proposes something far more radical: a Bangladesh alive with texture, dignity, contradiction, and irrepressible energy.

Under his direction, the troupe has staged 16 productions, including “Kanjus,” “In Search of an Honest Man,” “Election Caricature,” “Shakuntala,” “The Mousetrap,” and “Dewan Gazir Kissa”. These productions have earned praise from audiences and critics alike on stages across Sydney and Melbourne.

Late playback singer Bashir Ahmed will receive a posthumous honour, while legendary vocalist Syed Abdul Hadi and iconic magician Jewel Aich will be conferred lifetime achievement awards.

Written in 1899, “When We Dead Awaken” was Ibsen’s last dramatic work before his death. Often described as his most autobiographical play, it confronts the cost of artistic ambition, the burden of unrealised desire, and the uneasy space between creation and human intimacy. More than a century later, its themes remain strikingly contemporary.

In an interview, poet Richard Siken says, “Art doesn’t come from trauma, art comes from curiosity.” And we are most curious when the emotions we feel are so intense that even more than tending to them or managing to live through them, understanding them feels as crucial as breathing. Living with grief is painful, but living through meaningless grief is impossible. It is easy to mistake this exhibition as portrayals of trauma, of grieving, but such can’t be said when that is the reality people exist within. But it is just an exhibition of resistance, resilience and endurance than of torture and exploitation, sometimes more former than the latter.

Jatra troupes from different regions of the country participated through a registration-based process. The programme could not end on its scheduled date due to a period of state mourning and was brought to a close this week with its final events in the capital.

At its centre, the play interrogates a competitive social order that treats examinations as battlegrounds and achievement as survival. It raises direct questions about the responsibilities of parents, the emotional costs of ambition, and the fragile relationship between care and control. By framing these tensions through a child’s account, “Postmortem” exposes conflicts that are often dismissed as routine until their consequences become irreversible.

“Darpane Sharatshashi” was written by Manoj Mitra and originally directed by Aly Zaker, two towering figures of Bangla theatre. The 1992 staging became historic for its rare collaboration between Desh Natok and Nagorik Natya Sampradaya.

The finale opens today (Wednesday), January 21, at 6:30 pm at the Experimental Theatre Hall of Shilpakala Academy. Urmi Opera from Mohammadpur, Magura, will stage “Premer Shomadhi Tire”. The play is written by Nirmal Mukhopadhyay and directed by Shamim Khandakar.

After decades of artistic achievement, Abul Hayat continues to write; not out of obligation or ambition, but for the enduring joy that words bring him.

Dwip, a gallery well-known for its bold approach to art and being vocal about every social issue possible, is currently hosting a solo art exhibition by Shikdar Saikat titled “This Show is a Waste of Time”. Partnered by Ghartera and Sarridon Collective, this show talks about the current social, political, and economic situation of our country, fuelled by ignorance, fascism, extremism, misogyny, and the misuse of religion, through satire and dark humour. But just like a usual “aware” millennial, the artist made unique, high-quality artistic memes instead of going for typical or traditional methods.

Curated by a team led by architects Marina Tabassum and Tanzim Wahab, both participants in the movement, the museum preserves graffiti, debris, and personal belongings left behind on the day protesters stormed the residence. Exhibits include bloodstained clothing of victims and the final letter of a 16-year-old protester.

Written by acclaimed playwright, director and actor Mamunur Rashid, “Guinea Pig” is a sharp satire rooted in Bangladesh’s socio-economic and political reality. The story exposes how ordinary people are treated like test subjects by the state apparatus and the affluent, highlighting deep disparities in how life and dignity are valued.

“The Human Voice”, written by French playwright Jean Cocteau and first staged in 1930, is a one-act, single-character play. It follows a woman speaking to her lover for the last time on the telephone. He is set to marry someone else the next day. Over the course of the conversation, heartbreak, fear of abandonment and emotional col

The festival opened with the Chobi Mela Rally, which began at the National Press Club and moved through the city to the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy, culminating in an inaugural ceremony at the Jatiyo Chitrashala Auditorium.