வேல் வேல் Vel Vel: A Sonic Walk

Join us as we take the Thaipusam festival to the digital space this year!

Vel Vel: A Sonic Walk recreates the experience of walking the pilgrimage route through a multidisciplinary audio-visual-text experience, bringing together the music, sights, rituals, and colours of the past 5 decades of Singapore's Thaipusam celebrations. With each virtual "step" throughout the experience, you'll also be able to find out more about the music and sound you listen throughout the day of Thaipusam, stories of people taking part in the rituals, and the route & districts the procession passes through, which include the historic neighbourhoods of Little India, Selegie and Fort Canning.

The online experience also features writers from the young theatre collective Brown Voices (Karthik Somasundaram, Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai, Mumtaz Maricar, Lewin Bernard and Hashisha Nazir), who respond to both the experience of Thaipusam and the significant locations along the route that hold memories of pilgrims such as Perumal Temple, Selegie Point, Dhoby Ghaut, Overhead Bridge at Fort Canning and Thandayuthapani Temple at Tank Road.

Artist Credits:

Production Curators: Ramesh Krishnan, Laura Miotto & Lim Shu Min

Sound Designer: Ramesh Krishnan

Monologues Editor & Director: Grace Kalaiselvi

Writers: Karthikeyan Somasundaram, Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai, Mumtaz Maricar, Lewin Bernard and Hashisha Nazir

Voices: Karthikeyan Somasundaram, Rebekah Sangeetha Dorai, Mumtaz Maricar, Hemang Yadav, Hashisha Nazir and Grace Kalaiselvi

Photo Credits: KC Eng, Ramesh Ramakrishnan Iyer, Laura Miotto, The National Archives of Singapore

Web development: Er Yeow Hwee