MANY ART WORKS are ‘imprisoned’ in museums, galleries,  and private collections.  Today, 25 January 2026, we visited a collection of art ‘incarcerated’ in a prison.

 

The prison is, in fact, a former prison. It is what was once the grounds of Bangalore’s Central Jail.  After it became disused, it was converted into a public  park in 2008: Freedom Park. This contains many of the former prison’s buildings, which have been restored to create a fascinating museum within a leafy park.

 

Freedom Park was the site of the 2026 BLR Hubba, which we visited today. The Hubba is a 10-day annual art festival held in Bangalore. Each year it is held at one of the city’s historic landmarks. This year at the former jail.

Encompassing many kinds of art including  for example,  sculpture, painting, music, theatre, and poetry, this festival is  well-attended and vibrant.

 

At Freedom Park, the Hubba’s artwork and events were scattered all over the site of the former jail including within the cell blocks and at the place where hangings were carried out.

 

On the Sunday that we visited the Hubba, there was a competent jazz band playing and a crowd of visitors. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the art and themselves.

 In comparison with the rather disappointing 2025/26 Kochi Muziris Biennale,  which we attended in early January, the Hubba was wonderful: a well curated, excitingly appealing festival of art. Although the Hubba contained far fewer things than the much larger biennale, it produced a far more impressive impact on us than what we saw in Kochi