‘Cultural courier’ Nikki Bedi traverses globe to bring art into your home
“We aim to come here to really honour everything that we experience to the rest of the world,” notes globetrotting BBC presenter and host of The Arts Hour on Tour.
British radio and television broadcaster Nikki Bedi has made her way to Buenos Aires to investigate and appreciate the local cultural scene. Here to record next month’s edition of the The Arts Hour on Tour, which airs on the BBC World Service, she’s out to find and showcase the best local talent, taking the sounds of Argentina’s capital to a global audience.
Finding and showcasing local talents, the flagship BBC programme highlights arts and culture in cities across the world. This latest edition, recorded Tuesday night at the Ciudad Cultural Konex, featured a strong line-up of porteño performers and audiences – including Latin Grammy winner Dante Spinetta.
“The interesting thing about the arts is that you can understand so much about a country, a people, cultures, through the prism of film, television, visual arts, architecture, music poetry,” said Bedi in an interview. “You can say a lot more than perhaps you could in a current affairs programme, because people get to tell stories – and that’s what we love.”
How did the show come about and what made you decide to take it on tour?
We have a regular Arts Hour, which is a weekly show, and I take the best arts interviews from all over the BBC that I think are interesting. It could be Martin Scorsese talking about his latest movie, it could be an Israeli drama, it could be an author from Buenos Aires. We then use all of that as a jumping-off point to have a discussion in the studio, where we have curated audio, a practitioner, and a critic. We listen to that audio, and then we have a discussion. And in that discussion, we try to get all kinds of opinions, views, and storytelling in that one hour … it’s very wide-ranging.
The idea of taking it on the road was because when we went to the Biennale in Shanghai, we realised that getting stories from around the globe was really a fascinating hour that we could have.
We then did another show in
New Delhi, and again, we just thought, “This is really rich in terms of what we’re hearing.” That’s when one of the producers at the time said that this would be a great thing to take on the road. The first show we did was in Paris … then we went to Jerusalem, and since then we’ve been to 45 cities!
Is your curiosity and appreciation for cultures and the arts something that you’ve acquired through the show, or is there any definitive period in your life that you can recall as the origin for this passion?
I began my career as an actress in India – I have an Indian father and an English mother. Then, a TV station in the UK came looking for somebody who could straddle two worlds. I could make sense, for a British audience, of the things going on in the city of Bombay as it was then, but I really understood the complexion of Bombay’s society.
When I did my first interview – because I had never done an interview before in my life – I remember thinking, “Oh! I get to use my brain, I get to learn, I get to hear other people’s stories.” And that, for me, was the epiphany of me becoming a culture courier. But I think working for the BBC World Service and starting this job opened up a world that you don’t have access to anywhere else. It’s amazing.
What has travelling across the globe and experiencing these cities firsthand through a vehicle like the arts brought you?
I think every time we come back from one of these ‘Arts Hour on Tours,’ I have transformed. There’s been a transformation. You have had your mind and your heart open to stories and cultures and experiences and ideas that are so incredible and you can’t help but be changed by it. That’s the greatest education anybody can have, in my opinion. That’s why I always say that this is such a privilege, what I do. It’s an honour. And it’s joy filled. We make sure to have a lot of fun when we do these things.
This is your fourth time around in Latin America. You’ve done Mexico City, you’ve done Bogotá, São Paulo. Now, you’ve made your way over to Argentina during a very unique time…
I mean, we landed on a day when you elected a new president, so you couldn’t have more of a moment of change! Actually, that’s our producer Nicki Paxman’s big belief: that you need to look for something that’s shifting in a city in the world, or something that’s recovering. Change always means that there are more stories to tell from different points of view. Nicki always says, “You look for the grit in the oyster that’s going to make the pearl,” which is what we do. It’s so true. If there’s something going on that’s changing, that’s when art becomes really interesting.
This city has, historically, a very rich culture but particularly, in the past decade or so, I’d say it has garnered such an incredible amount of international attention through chart topping music, feature films… How do you think the case of Buenos Aires and Argentina’s cultural prominence speaks to the importance of the arts and what it does for a country?
Well, firstly, it can tell so many stories through words, through visuals. But also, it brings people together. It really does. Thoughts and ideas can be provoked by experiencing a piece of art. It’s also interesting what you’re saying about the music in Argentina, because the Spanish language music is suddenly a lingua franca that we’ve never experienced before.
If I put hits 2023 on Spotify right now, a quarter of that music will be in the Spanish language. And that is incredible! They have not had to suddenly say, “We’ve got to make this more acceptable to an Englishspeaking North American audience,” so that’s really good to see coming through.
But I think all arts and entertainment have the potential to: one, affect change; two, make people think, make people see somebody else’s point of view; and three, just make people come together. It sounds a little bit woo-woo and new age, but it’s true.
Argentina coach Lionel Scaloni on Tuesday cast doubt over his continuation as coach of the national side, saying his players need someone with “all the energy possible.”
“Now it’s time to stop the ball and start thinking. I have a lot of things to think about during this time. These players have given us, all the coaching staff, a lot of things and I need to think about what I’m going to do,” Scaloni told a news conference.
“It’s not goodbye, but I need to think, because the bar is very high. It’s difficult to go on and keep winning. This national team needs a coach who has all the energy possible and who is well. I will communicate this to the president [of AFA, Claudio ‘Chiqui’ Tapia] and to the boys.”
The remarks stunned Argentines, who were celebrating a historic win against their arch-rivals – Brazil had not lost a World Cup qualifier at home since 1954 prior to Tuesday night’s loss.
Scaloni, who had no top-level experience of coaching prior to taking charge of the national side, has led the Albiceleste through a glorious spell. The side won the Copa América in 2021, the World Cup in Qatar in 2022 and defeated Italy to win the Finalissima.
The ex-mallorca defender was voted best coach in the world at FIFA’S The Best awards after winning Argentina’s third World Cup. Commenting on the incidents in the stands at the Maracanã, Scaloni said the images were “very ugly” and that he was happy his players refused to play until the violence had stopped.
“Some of them had close relatives there, they didn’t know if they were there or not. Playing a match in those conditions is not easy, even so, the match went as we planned, with them looking for a lot of play infield,” he added of the clashes between Argentine fans, Brazilians and Rio de Janeiro police.
Argentina will close out 2023 as leaders of the South American qualifying group for the 2026 World Cup, having taken 15 points out of a possible 18.