Chennai’s Arts & Culture

Kalakshetra Foundation, Chennai

Kalakshetra, as the name suggests, is a centre for artistic endeavour. Founded in 1936 by the vibrant visionary Rukmini Devi Arundale, the Institution stands testimony to her dream of creating a space where the essence of Indian thought would find expression through artistic education. An institution she established with the vision “of imparting to the young the true spirit of Art, devoid of vulgarity and commercialism." 

Spread over almost 100 acres by the seashore in Chennai, the Kalakshetra Foundation, as it is known today, is a vital centre for the study and performance of fine arts, envisioned and designed with the style and proportion of Indian aesthetics. 

Dr Padma Subramanianm’s Dance School in Gandhi Nagar

NRITHYODAYA was founded in 1942 in Chennai by Director K. Subrahmanyam - a film pioneer and Nationalist - who was a great parental personality in the cultural world. The objective of the founder was to propagate the Arts of Dance and Music in their true dimension and teach them free of charge to the deserving who cannot afford to pay and learn. Nrithyodaya is - perhaps one among the very few institutions in the country - serving the field of Culture for sixty years. Since the Founder had close links with UNESCO, Nrithyodaya was even functioning as UNESCO Information Centre till 1972.

In the early sixties, Dr. Padma Subrahmanyam (Founder's youngest daughter) took over as the Director of Nrithyodaya. In 1971, when the Founder passed away, his Eldest son V. Balakrishnan (a reputed Documentary Film, Producer, Director and Cinematographer for over four decades) became its President