Gil Halsted and Amit Pal spoke with Vamsi Matta, a Bangalore-based theatre actor, writer, and director whose practice is influenced by his Dalit identity, experience and social location. Listen: https://www.wortfm.org/come-eat-with-me/
The histories of his family and community inform the questions, topics, and mediums that Vamsi engages with through his work.
His most recent traveling solo show performance, Come Eat With Me, – an invitation to folks from all caste, faith and race locations – has received a tremendous response in the national and regional media across India.
His play, Star in the Sky about the institutional murder of a Dalit PhD scholar in 2016, often seen as a moment of reckoning for Indian academia’s inherent caste biases, won second place at the prestigious Tata Literature Live! Sultan Padamsee Award For Playwriting.
While in Madison, Vamsi is excited to engage with UW–Madison’s own reckoning with historic inequities and contributing to its present campus culture and goals of fostering a greater sense of inclusion and belonging through the arts.