RR Circle Member Miheeka Daggubati has spent the past year building something Hyderabad did not know it needed. Art Connect, which she founded under her creative practice Mudita Tribe, is a cultural platform with a point of view, one that has, across three exhibitions, made a persuasive case for Hyderabad as a serious destination on the Indian art map.
The platform opened with LUME / VYANA, conceived with artists like Amrita Kilachand and Hina Ahmed, bringing together Dipesh Raj, Gunjan Arora, Harisha Chennangod, Madhuri Kathe, and Valay Shende. Contemporary Now: Hyderabad Edition II followed, drawing five galleries to the city, including Art Alive and Ojas Art from Delhi, Archer Art Gallery from Ahmedabad, and Ashvita's and Asign from Chennai. Thirty-three artists, from Amit Ambalal and Paresh Maity to Bhuri Bai, Maya Burman, and Vinod Daroz, gave the show a breadth that was panoramic.
On Medhyaa and the Logic of Letting Material Lead
For her latest show, Medhyaa, Daggubati worked with Threadarte and artists Rahul Jain and Gunjan Arora, whose practices are built entirely around textiles. When asked about the curatorial approach, Miheeka said, “Through Medhyaa, the main focus wasn’t on imposing a meaning to the material, but it was all about letting the narrative through the act of making.
The anchor piece of the show was Reaching Beyond, an aerial installation featuring four suspended panels that read as a single form. Around it, works including Kshitij, Anaadi, and Finding My Ground traced ideas of continuity, transformation, and the kind of self-knowledge that tends to arrive slowly. The accompanying lighting collection, Prayaan, handcrafted in brass and steel, extends the same thinking into objects designed to live in a room. Pieces like Vayun and Udita carry the same meditative quality as the sculptures around them. The line between art and object, here, is deliberately thin.
On how Art Connect stays concept-driven across each successive show, Daggubati answers that the two were never separate concerns to begin with. "The starting point of anything I have worked on to date is always the work itself. Apart from this, being attentive to what it holds also plays a key role," she says.
On Hyderabad and the Longer Game
When asked about the cultural relevance of Medhyaa, Daggubati says, "Culture is no longer defined by visibility or scale, but by resonance," she says. "In a landscape that is increasingly fast and image-driven, what feels meaningful are practices that resist that speed." It is a position that has shaped every decision Art Connect has made, and one that sits at odds with the way most platforms in this space tend to operate.
As for Hyderabad, Daggubati sees the city's cultural foundation as something to build on carefully. "The focus is on creating a space where people can gather, engage, and return, where art becomes something you can spend time with in a way that feels natural and approachable," she says.
The ambition is not just a well-curated room, but a community that outlasts any single show and becomes, over time, part of how the city sees itself.