Jan 24 2026 to Jan 24 2026 4:45 p.m.

Where

Alliance Française de Bangalore

Thimmaiah Rd, opposite UNI, Kaverappa Layout, Vasanth Nagar 560052

Event Description

Futures Hubba originated as an ideas-festival at BLR Hubba, where some of the brightest national and international minds play Nostradamus to connect the dots of a likely future for humanity. It is a gathering designed to hold space for contradictions and uncertainty in this technology-shifting era, and to explore what new forms of meaning can emerge between the known and the unknown.

Futures is a space for collective imagination: it’s a space that holds tension between art and algorithm, ethics and innovation, intuition and data. It resists the safety of linear silos and instead operates at the intersections, where new ways of thinking are born from friction. Each session inside Futures is a deliberate provocation: a chance to expand what we consider knowledge, and to explore how interdisciplinary thinking might co-create more conscious futures.

The Fool Who Knows | Varun Marichi | 5:45 PM
The Fool Who Knows is a mime and physical-clowning performance that explores intelligence in an age of certainty. Through failure, hesitation, and embodied play, the fool reveals what rational systems often miss: that not-knowing is not a weakness, but a form of wisdom. In a world obsessed with control and prediction, this performance invites the audience to sit with uncertainty, and recognise it as the starting point of all futures.

What is the Future of Art? | Reema Desai Gehi | 5:15 PM
Amid global upheaval, what role is creative expression called upon to fulfil? How does it remain responsive in an age where technology has advanced beyond human comprehension, and where self-censorship quietly precedes its public counterpart? Can art, in its many forms, truly function as a living archive of the present moment? Reema Desai Gehi engages with these pressing inquiries as she reflects on the evolving landscape of art through the prism of ART India magazine’s 30th anniversary.

Human Dreams and Speculative Machines | Horst Höertner | 6 PM
The real disruption today is not AI, robotics, or digital culture: it is the shifting role of creativity itself. Art and technology have stopped reflecting the world and started constructing it. Drawing on 30 years working at the intersection of art and technology, Horst Hörtner shows how real innovation emerges when artists and technologists are given the freedom to challenge foundational assumptions. This lecture pulls back the curtain on how Ars Electronica turns experimentation into institutional practice, how it protects curiosity from bureaucracy, and why the future will belong to organizations that stop optimizing the present and start prototyping new realities. Art and tech will transform society. The only choice left is whether to participate, or be shaped by those who do.

Rise of Creative & Cultural AI Models | Caroline Pegram & Kartini Ludwig | 7 PM
Join Caroline Pegram and Kartini Ludwig as they chart the evolving fusion of music and machines, from the early days of algorithmic composition to today’s rise of generative sound factories. This session offers a clear foundation on how AI models are steering creative approaches, authorship, and performance and looks at the rise and possible uses of creative & cultural foundation models. The talk will extend beyond reflection, challenging attendees to consider how we might intentionally design fair and sustainable futures for music, where machines amplify and augment human creativity. There’ll be fresh insights, critical questions, and an invitation to rethink what it means to compose and create in an age of sonic mutation.

2º: An Immersive Sonic Performance | Tarun Balani & Parizad D | 8 PM
2° is a live audio-visual performance by drummer–composer Tarun Balani and visual artist Parizad D that shares stories and messages about the artists’ experience of climate change. The performance unfolds through shifting sonic textures, experimental ambient sounds and immersive visual worlds inviting the audiences to deeply listen and inhabit these worlds. As a part of the performance audiences are encouraged to reflect, share and contribute their own climate change stories and messages on postcards —linking sound and touch—creating a sensory dialogue. 2° serves as a reminder that every story and every voice matters and our individual stories have the power to begin conversations about climate equity, justice, and our shared responsibility to reimagine the future of our world.

About BIC Elsewhere:

While the majority of our events find a home at our premises in Domlur, BIC Elsewhere represents our commitment to bringing conversations, arts, and culture directly to diverse audiences. Through this initiative, we collaborate with various venues, extending the reach of our events beyond our own space. These partnerships not only breathe life into our gatherings but also play a crucial role in cultivating an environment for the flourishing of arts and culture in the city.

In collaboration with:

Speakers & Performers

Varun Marichi
Mime Artist
Varun Marichi is a Bengaluru based mime and theatre artist, specialized in clowning, known for his expressive, audience engaging performances. He has been in the field for over a decade and honed his craft with the Emoticons Theatre, developing a distinctive style that brings depth and important conversations to the stage, weaving them into performances that are engaging, playful, and emotionally powerful.

Reema Desai Gehi
Editor, ART India
Reema Desai Gehi is the Editor of ART India. An alumna of Cardiff University (UK), Reema completed her Master’s degree with a special focus on arts journalism.

In 2024, she authored her debut book, The Catalyst: Rudolf von Leyden and India’s Artistic Awakening, published in English by Speaking Tiger. The book was subsequently translated into German and published by Draupadi Verlag.

Horst Hörtner
Founder, Ars Electronica Futurelab
Horst Hörtner is a media artist and researcher specializing in human-machine interaction. He holds several patents in this field, particularly on technologies related to drone swarm flights (outdoor drone shows “Spaxels”), which his lab presented as a world premiere in 2012.

Hörtner co-founded the media art group x-space, which received recognition at the Prix Ars Electronica in the early 1990s. In 1995 he joined Ars Electronica and founded the Ars Electronica Futurelab in 1996, which he directs since then. In 2020, he also took on the role of the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Ars Electronica.

Caroline Pegram
Head of Tech & Innovation, SXSW Sydney
For over two decades, Caroline Pegram has worked as a producer for award winning companies and celebrated media personalities, with a specialisation in science & technology communications. In 2017, she ventured into the world of Artificial Intelligence working in Innovation & Strategy Director roles with Australian music companies to help expand their technology businesses and global partnerships.

In 2020 Caroline led the team that won the very first global AI ‘Eurovision’ Song Contest. In 2022, she was a finalist in the Women in AI Awards, and became a Cybernetics Imagination Resident at the Australian National University, where she holds an affiliate role. In 2023, Caroline joined the team at SXSW Sydney as the Head of Tech & Innovation.

Kartini Ludwig
Founder, KOUP Music
Kartini Ludwig has over a decade of experience as a creative professional, collaborative artist and entrepreneur. She is the Director of creative digital studio Kopi Su Studio and Founder of AI music platform KOUP Music. In 2024, KOUP Music was made the Top 10 of the CSIRO National AI Sprint. She has spoken at TEDxSydney and SXSW Sydney advocating for fairly trained AI models to unlock new opportunities for creative communities long term.

Tarun Balani
Multi-Disciplinary Artist, Musician & Educator
Tarun Balani is a multi-disciplinary artist, musician, and educator known for crafting immersive sonic experiences that blend improvisation, composition, performance, and technology. Regarded as one of India’s finest musicians and composers, Balani’s work spans contemporary jazz, ambient electronic music, and sonic storytelling, exploring themes of climate change, migration, and identity.

As bandleader of his boundary-pushing quartet, Balani collaborates with forward-thinking jazz artists to reimagine the genre through their cross-cultural influences. Their latest album, ڪڏهن ملنداسين Kadahin Milandaasin (2025), traces his Sindhi heritage, weaving traditional folk elements with modern jazz.

Balani’s music has been featured on WNYC, BBC, GQ, and Rolling Stone India, and he has performed at Roskilde, Jazz Ahead, Magnetic Fields, NH7 Weekender, Serendipity Arts Festival, and London’s Jazz Café.

With a practice that bridges past and future, personal and universal, Balani continues to evolve as a sonic storyteller, shaping new narratives through music.

Parizad D
Interdisciplinary Visual Artist
Parizad D is an interdisciplinary visual artist. Her works span from commercial photography to contemporary art. She has worked with clients such as included Meta, Netflix, Rolling Stone, and more; and featured as an emerging talent on the cover of Asian Photography. Her current practice includes video-art, scan-art, x-ray imaging, analog photography, alternative print-making and poetry.

Her debut photobook dear melancholy, published by Method ArtSpace was longlisted for Toto Funds the Arts Award. She has participated in multiple residencies across India and Europe, and exhibited her work in spaces such as Gallery Espace, STIR Gallery, Offset Projects and more.

She combines art, music and technology by collaborating with musicians to create live- audio-visual performances at venues such as NMACC, G5A Foundation, BIC; festivals like Magnetic Fields, Serendipity Arts Festival, and Lollapalooza. She has been invited to speak at events such as All About Music, IFP Festival, EyeMyth Festival, Spotify’s culture workshop, and more.

Most recently she was creative consultant with Sony Music India, crafting visual identities for musicians; and premiered her audio-visual project “rise and fall” a global collaboration between Indian and Polish cultures, slated for it’s international premier at Adelaide Fringe Festival 2026.