DIAA ‘Dialogue Interactive Artists Association’, is an artists’ run organization. It is situated at Kopaweda Para in Kondagaon, Bastar District, Chhattisgarh, India.
Four of its founding members, adivasi artists Rajkumar Korram, Shantibai, Gessuram Viswakarma from Bastar and Navjot Altaf from Mumbai, first met in 1997 at Shilpi Gram, an institution conceived and built by a well-known adivasi bell metal sculptor Jaidev Baghel from Kondagaon with the vision to encourage interaction between local as well as visiting artists from any part of the world. The decision to work side by side in a workshop environment at Shilpi Gram was mutual and the process helped the 4 artists create a ground for a dialogue between them, who come from different socio-cultural and economic backgrounds.
While continuing within the mode of parallel art practices, the artists along with resource persons’ / art historians Dr Shivaji Paninkar and Bhanu Padamsee deeply engaged themselves with the art historical questions concerning art /craft binaries, parallel, interactive, cooperative and collaborative art practices in the context of contemporary art in India or elsewhere. In 2000, they mutually negotiated a strategy to explore collaboration as an experiment which over the period resulted into site specific projects such as ‘Nalpar’ (hand pump sites) and ‘Pilla Gudis’ (Temples for children). These ongoing projects are inclusive of community members from the neighborhoods, municipal officials and the local schools’ participation.