New Delhi (Sputnik) — The Mexican Embassy in New Delhi is on an interesting mission to track down a handful of Indian artists who participated in the "World Children's Painting Festival" in Mexico City in 1968. The artists, who were kids at the time, are now grown up adults.
The theme of the painting festival organized in 1968 by the Mexican government to coincide with the Olympic Games was "Un Mundo de Amistad" meaning "A World of Friendship."
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"The project "A World of Friendship — 50 years later" is preparing an exhibition in Mexico City, to feature the few surviving pieces of the originally 1,800-strong collection. To acknowledge the contribution of those children to the painting festival, the embassies of Mexico worldwide are searching for the participants, who would now be adults," a Mexican Embassy official told ANI news agency.
Despite the very limited information available, the embassy was able to track down one participant from Gujarat, with the help of Ahmedabad-based journalist Mr. Ketan Trivedi of Chitralekha magazine. The participant, Jitendra Navnitlal Parikh, who was 15 at the time, was a student of Shree Sayaji High School in Baroda, and his painting entitled "Market," was submitted to the festival. Unfortunately, he passed away in 1998 after a prolonged illness, according to the Indian Journal of Diplomacy.
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The other Indian participants were Sujata Sharma (aged 14 at the time), New Delhi; Ira Sachdeva (aged 12 at the time), Delhi; Sanat Kundu (aged 13 at the time); Vivek Kuchibhatla (aged 9 at the time); Ela Ems (aged 8 at the time) and Leela Sudakaran, who had probably traveled all the way to Mexico to paint murals, the journal adds.