For a part-documentary part-fiction film on the Bengali writer Nabarun Bhattacharya’s life and work which will explore his creative and psychological processes. The film will experiment with the ‘fantastic’ in an attempt to push the bounds of cinematic art and of current practices in the documentary and fiction film modes. The film will be disseminated through international television channels, film festivals, the internet and other non-mainstream avenues.
For a two-day colloquium titled ‘Locating Art Histories: Dialogues on Language, Writing, and Research in India’ organised by the Asia Art Archive (AAA) in New Delhi. The colloquium builds upon the Bibliography project AAA has been doing for the last three years, and will engage with the question of art writing in various Indian languages.
For the second phase of an Alternative Photography project that captures the socio-economic changes in Daniya village of Almora through dry plate Collodion photography. The photographs produced through this experimental process will be published as limited edition handmade albums, a coffee table book of scanned original photographs for wider circulation, a process documentation booklet and DVD.
For facilitating a series of visual arts appreciation workshops for all the students of a school (Classes Eight, Nine and Ten). He will collaborate with a visual arts college and local artists to design and execute the grant.
For a series of workshops with teachers from a school, which are expected to sensitise them to theatre education and expose them to the process adopted by the grantee as she works with them to realise a school production. Following the workshop, a smaller group of interested teachers will adapt a school text and co-direct plays in the school. The final productions will be shared with the school community.
For an exploration into the ethos of local Jatres (traditional fairs) with students, peers and teachers in the region. These grants will enable teachers to re-introduce students to the idea of Jatres as a storehouse of living traditions and help students contextualize this in terms of what they have learnt through their school texts. The students will document and also re-construct a Jatre within the school to celebrate with the village community.
This Grant was Terminated by IFA and the Grantee is ineligible to apply to IFA in the future.
For research towards production and dissemination across six tier B cities of a performance piece, tentatively titled Notes on Chai. The performance will explore the idea of the quotidian in everyday life, by combining realistic character-based pieces with abstract sounds.
For the production of a series of films and the curation of workshops and screenings through which a group of ten to fifteen young filmmakers will be trained to create site-specific moving image content. The objective is to generate audio-visual imagery that explores the cinematic form and engages the cultural, political and historical context of Assam from a location grounded within the region, dispelling the prevalent myth of the Northeast as peripheral within a national context.
For research towards a curatorial project exploring the history of early sound and sound technology through archival research and interviews, as well as artistic collaborations between the researcher and a Bombay-based curator, artists, sound recordists, sound theorists, musicians, linguists, researchers and writers whose practices contribute to an understanding of sound ecologies in India.
